MMA Fighting - The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani - Episode 296

Episode Date: August 24, 2015

Ariel Helwani speaks to Luke Rockhold, Carlos Condit, Michael Bisping, Ali Abdel-Aziz, and John Pollock. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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And 15. Hello again, everyone. I'm Ariel Halwani inside our New York City studio. Thank you so very much for joining us. We are about 13 hours or so removed from UFC Fight Night Saskatoon. The UFC's debut in beautiful Saskatchewan. The Paris of the Prairie. And it was a fun event.

It's always weird watching a UFC event on a Sunday. Everything seems off. You know, I'm not used to coming on around 12 hours later to talk about it, but it's a lot of fun because it feels like this is the post-fight show. Somewhat delayed post-fight show. But it makes for a tricky time because one of the big stories last night coming out of that event, the sudden retirement of Frankie Perez, 26 years old, wins this first UFC fight, improves to 10 and 2, I believe.

knocks out Sam Stout wins a bonus so he's now $50,000 richer and in the cage he just retires and I loved it I loved everything he had to say

how often in combat sports do you see a young man mid-20s pick up his first UFC win reaches the goal that he has been striving for

and then just walks away usually we see guys stick around a little too long I mean in that fight alone the juxtaposition of both careers was fascinating. You have one guy

who we now think is sticking around probably a little too long and another guy who's leaving before he really gets to realize his potential. And so I wanted to have him

on the show today, but he's traveling. That's the problem with the Sunday show. My colleague, Chuck Minnhal, spoke to him. That article will be up in a matter of moments

later on today on M.AFighting.com. Interesting things he had to say and a very memorable way to end one's career. We'll see if he actually sticks to it. But of course,

the big news last night coming out of Saskatchewan, the main event that we had all been looking forward to, the people's main event, one of those rare times where the people's main event is the real main event. Max Holloway, Charles Oliva, it ends on a very sour note. Charles Olivera, according to a report from MMA junkie and other outlets, suffered a micro-taire in his esophagus. Now that could be potentially fatal, and you see the way he reacted to it, somewhat of a delayed reaction. That is super scary stuff. He told our own Guillermo Cruz that he had been battling a neck injury heading into this fight. Thought he was 100%. I guess it's related. Who knows, I'm not a doctor. But that is scary. Soft Gus tear? I mean, just saying it is very painful.

So we hope he recovers. We hope he's okay. It's not the way we wanted the fight to go. It's not the way anyone thought the fight would go. Certainly, I saw some people criticizing Max Holloway for the way he celebrated. You have to understand that these are guys and women who are training eight, nine, ten months for these fights. It all leads to this crescendo. There's a lot of pressure, a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress. There's a lot going on. And when you notice that you had just, you know, want to fight, you're victorious. You're going to celebrate for a second. But you see Max all the way afterwards. You see the way he, you know, seemed concerned and was really unable to fully appreciate his victory. You understand that this is a human being who was just reacting in the

moment. He was happy. Wanted to celebrate with his family. Loved ones, cage side. Cut the guy some slack. We don't know what's going on in their minds. And I don't think that makes him seem like, you know, a bad person or an asshole or anything like that. He reacted. He thought he did something that led to the victory. Maybe he did. It seems in hindsight that it was just a freak injury, an unfortunate injury, and he was just reacting to the fact that, hey, he trained and he won a fight. And now he can continue his career. He has a very nice winning streak, and it's going to be interesting to see what the UFC does with him. Do they do the rematch? Do they go in a different direction? He asked for Frankie Edgar in Hawaii. There's a few ways that the UFC can book Max Holloway now. So we'll talk about that and a whole lot more.

Another busy week in the world of mixed martial arts in the books. Big news. Rhonda Rousey. breaking some news on Good Morning America on Friday, announcing that she'll be fighting Holly Home, not Misha Tate, not Amanda Nunes, Holly Home, January 2nd, UFC 195. There's that, there's UFC 133, a ton to get to, so let's get into it. Today's show, another stacked one, as always. Want to hear from you around 345. Hit us up using the hashtag the MMA hour, leave a question or comment in the comment section below. At 325, we're going to talk to Mike Winklejohn, who, of course, is the last.

longtime head coach and mentor for one Holly home. I want to get his thoughts on this title fight. Is she ready? How does he see it going down? All that stuff. So looking forward to have Coach Wink, a straight shooter, if you will. This is a guy who doesn't sugarcoat his answers. I like that. Ephraine Escadero stops by at 305. He's a coach on Tough Latin America 2. That premieres on Fight Pass on Wednesday, and he's also fighting in Monterey in November. Great story there. Dan Hardy, Speaking of great stories, he's got a great one to tell at 245. He's embarking on a pretty serious endeavor coming up very soon.

Looking forward to talking to him at 245. 225 Michael Bisping, who it was announced. Last week we'll be fighting Robert Whitaker, UFC193, perhaps the biggest show in UFC history. They're shooting for 70K in Melbourne, Melbourne, Eddie Hat Stadium. That's a big one. Michael Bispin will join us at 225, of course, coming off that big win over. Talis Lightish in Scotland last month. Carlos Condit's in the main event of UFC 193.

Excuse me, I think of 129, which up until this date, up until 193, still the reigning and defending biggest show in UFC history, but that could change come November. He's going to join us at 205 to talk about Robbie Lawler and that big Walterway title fight. 145. We're going to talk to Ali Abdel-Ziz, WSOF Executive Vice President. He has some news to break. It's always exciting. And at 125, we're going to have Luke Rockhold on.

Of course, last week on the show we had Chris Wyman on, had some very interesting things to say about his opponent at 194. Luke Rockhold, going to get his response and a whole lot more at around 125. But first, let us go to the phone lines and welcome in my good pal, host over at the Fight Network, also does great work on live audio wrestling, 1,000 podcasts. Fellow Canadian John Pollock joins us right now from Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

John, are you there? I'm here, Ariel. It's great to be here on the Hayman Hustle with you. Yes. What did you think of that, by the way? My little cameo. The first ever guest host in the history of the critically acclaimed Haman Hustle,

what do you think? I liked it. It was Ariel Heelwani, the advocate for the advocate. Yes, that's very well said. I got to say I had fun. It wasn't quite 100% heel. It was kind of dipping my toe into the heel

waters, so to speak. But it was fun. I mean, you know, if someone's going to acknowledge where it all started, it might as well be Paul Heyman. It didn't go his way last night in Brooklyn. And we'll get to that in a second. But that's a great segue. Because I want to ask you, between SummerSlam last night, UFC Fight Night Saskatoon last

night as well, and NXT takeover on Saturday. What was the best show of the weekend, in your opinion? Oh, the best show of the weekend? I would say the takeover special on Saturday. I just thought it was such a well-presented event. I think the entire NXT experiment has been something that I think is really fascinating to watch what the WWE has grown, where you've essentially created your own underground indie under the WWE umbrella, where this audience, they believe they are going to a non-WWE show and selling 15,000 tickets,

however many tickets they sold on Saturday night. this is not just some small niche. This is a successful brand now that they have created, which has been their goal dating back to 2002 when they did the original brand split. Do you think the UFC could pull something like this off? I think they kind of did to a degree with the WEC, but the problem was I always felt there was a feeling to the WEC

where the brand you wanted to be promoting, the hotter brand was the UFC. You had all of these excellent fighters but I think that there was an audience that it was UFC or nothing for them, and that was why they eventually just merged everything together and promoted it under the stronger brand. I don't know if there's necessarily that need for the UFC to create some kind of sub-brand. I think we're kind of getting that now within the different tiered fight cards that we see every month.

It would be interesting, though, if the UFC created this underground promotion with no, you know, Reebok rules, no use out of all. the stuff, all the stuff that gets the internet fans in a tizzy, and see the way the market reacts to it. You know what I mean? Like almost, you know, creating their own competition, of course, and Bell Tour is doing a pretty good job with that right now. But could you imagine if they did, they probably would never do that because why split your resources? But I'd be fascinated to see how people would react. I feel like they would actually react pretty well to it. Yeah, I don't know. I think that with the WWE, you certainly have this audience that want

something very different from what their main roster is providing, and you're able to pretty much customize your product to your fan base. I think with mixed martial arts, it's kind of in a different realm, and I don't really sense that, that desire from a lot of fight fans, to want to really differentiate. I mean, these UFC cards, you are appealing to the hardcore fan base, and then there's fights that will bring in the much larger scope of fans that maybe only watch a handful of shows each and every year. I don't know how much more you could put on the calendar at this point other than taking kind of your lower-based fight cards and to me promoting them as anything other

than UFC. I think you're doing more damage than good. Okay, fair enough. Last night must have been very busy for you because you have become the face of UFC in Canada. Who would have thought Joe Poe, John Pollock, Toronto Zone, becomes the face of UFC Canada because you're hosting all the pre-fight, post-fight coverage, all of you know, the pre-fight, post-fight coverage, all that stuff on the flight network, which is a great story, and it's great for you guys that you actually have that deal. But you also have SummerSlam going on, and you've got live audio resting all that stuff. How are you able to keep tabs on everything?

It was a very busy night. Yeah. I was not going to try and tackle both at the same time. I mean, last night we had, we had our crew in Saskatoon doing UFC coverage, and then back here in Toronto, I was doing the studio work along with a man you're familiar with, Gabe Merenci, who is another personality on our network. So we were back here in the studio, and Sunday night was just,

it was all USC for me. I was not going to try and be balancing both. So we were on the air at 6 p.m. doing our pre-fight show, the prelim aired on the fight network at 7, and then we were on immediately after the main event for about two hours. So my night finished at about 2 a.m.,

and then I came home to watch SummerSlam. You did a two-hour post-fight show? Yes. We did it. Why? Well, we go on immediately after. after the main event, and then we're pretty much just staying there until the press conference begins, and then the press conference was not a super long press conference, and then we came back,

and just because of all the content we had from Saskatoon, post-fight interviews, analysis from John Randi and Robin Black, it was all elements we had to get to, so it turned into a two-hour show. Wow, that's amazing. It was a long night. Yes. So I appreciate you joining us now. So what would you do with Max Holloway now? Like I said, great winning streak.

You know, he hasn't lost since that loss to Connor McGregor in Boston around two years ago, almost exactly two years ago. But the fight ends in a wacky fashion. Thank God, no serious injury suffer. I mean, in terms of, it sounds like a very serious injury. It's a micro-terrorismophagus, for God's sake. So that is serious in its own right. But thank God nothing worse happened in the cage Sunday night in Saskatoon to Charles Olivera. But what do you do with Holloway?

Do you do the rematch? Do you go with Frankie Edgar, who on Twitter today said he'd like to fight either Holloway or Jeremy Stevens? Do you go with Chad Mendes? What do you do if you're Sean Shelby? I think that it's not a fight that I was very much looking forward to this fight going in. I think everyone was. In terms of the 12 fights, that was the gem on top of this card. I just don't see them putting both guys in a holding pattern for another four or five months.

And who knows to what degree Charles Oliver is going to be ready to just enter a fight camp immediately. after this. I mean, it is something that hopefully he is 100% healthy from this. But at the same time, I don't want to hold back Max Holloway at this point. I mean, it is kind of an asterisk that you play with this seventh victory in a row, but I think

that it makes a whole lot of sense to look in this Frankie Ed's the direction. I like that fight a lot for a number of reasons. A, it's a very interesting fight. B, if you are to put it, towards the end of the year, I think it serves the exact same purpose as Jacques-Rae and Yel L. Romero on that one

card where you are either at worst building the next contender or in the event of some kind of an injury, you do have two options here to fill in that squad at the last minute with two top feather weights training for relatively that same time period. So you like that idea more than Edgar Mendez, which is a fight that I feel like we've been talking about for years now? I think that Matt Hall, I mean, you can't really go wrong of those three featherweights. I just feel that Chad Mendes, he's not somebody that I see challenging for the title with a win. I think that almost nullifies, whereas Frankie Edgar and Max Holloway, I think whoever wins that fight is instantly into that next contender role.

So if I'm going of those three, Mendes is kind of in that third slot for me. I think that loss does play some of the stack. Sounds like you like Mendes Stevens, Edgar Holloway. And do Edgar Holloway as the main event of the tough finale the night before, Aldo McGregor, all eyes on the featherweight division, you get your number one contender. That sounds like a pretty good idea, right? I think that's a great idea,

where you're going to have all of that spotlight that weekend on the middleweight and featherweight divisions, and coming out of that weekend, hopefully, knock on where you will have your next title fight, at least in the public's mind of the fight they want to see in both great classes. Do you like the idea of putting a show before that gigantic 194 card? because, you know, I see it as a way to promote the pay-per-view one last time, and, you know, it's better than after the fact on Sunday, like we did, you know, at 189 and last year at 175,

because that always felt like you were sticking around at the party way too long. But even before, I mean, you're loading up a lot on the calendar. There's a lot to digest. Do you like that idea? Do you like when the UFC doubles up like this? Yeah, I'm not a gigantic fan of the Sunday night immediately following, especially such a big card. I was there much like you for 175 last year, and I mean, you talk about the party ending early. I mean, that quickly turned into a funeral Sunday night for that first conference after.

I mean, just a very dire tone to that entire evening by the end of things involving Frankie Edgar. But, yeah, I kind of like the Friday night show. It's getting set. It's very much like what the WWE did this past weekend. It wasn't trying to present the massive show on the Saturday and then come back with something smaller. it was kind of this subproduct on the Saturday night, building up to the pay-per-view on Sunday. Granted, they

are just sticking around for a third night in Brooklyn tonight. That is true. Monday Night Raw. I might make an appearance. Who knows? Let me ask you about Frankie Perez, because to be honest, I almost got a little emotional listening to what he had to say. I mean, here's a guy who had just won,

knocked out a great fighter and Sam Stout. You know, both you and I think, you know, we try to be as unbiased as possible, but the Canadian guys, especially Team Tompkins, and the guys who kind of help put Canada on the map in MMA, I'd say we have a bit of a soft spot for those guys, and, you know, it sucks to see him lose third time in a row via K or TKO. But here you have a young guy like Frankie Perez. I remember seeing Frankie Perez in the gym at Foxwood's last year. Mark Henry was there telling me, look at this guy. This is going to be the future right here.

And here he is wins his first UFC fight in his second outing inside the Octagon and just retires on the spot and says he doesn't want to put his family through this anymore, all that stuff. and I think unanimously on Twitter and all that, people were, you know, pretty much in awe of this guy. Wow, good for you. You're able to walk away. And then they go, I don't know if you saw this, but they go to the studio with Michael Bisping, and he says, look, if you don't have the Cajonies, then you shouldn't be doing this, you know, see you later. Don't let the door, you know, hit you on the way out, which is fine. To me, it's like, okay, great. You know, he said how he felt, he felt, he felt how he felt, he felt, he felt, he felt. And then people are ripping on Bisping for it. I mean, I don't understand. Sometimes they say the coverage is too fluffy, and then when someone says something that they feel like is, you know, maybe too honest or maybe a little dickish,

they get mad at the guy. The guy can't win. No one can win in this scenario. Regardless, what do you think of Frankie doing that inside the cage? I thought this was just one of the most bizarre post-fight interactions ever. I mean, there were a bunch of them. Yeah, there were some strange ones. But this one, I mean, Frankie Perez catches him with that right hand,

finishes them with strikes, impressive. And then afterwards, I mean, if you think a retirement is coming, obviously, you were assuming it would have been Sam Stout, but instead, Frankie Prez just with that line that comes out of nowhere. This is my first DFC win, and now it's going to be my last. And afterwards, John Ramden from playing out, he spoke to Frankie Perez. And I mean, he's saying everything that he said, I had the best camp of my life. Yeah. I went out there. I performed. I mean, everything that would indicate, man, where is this guy going to be going next in the up for one 555-pound weight class.

There's something that clearly he's not, I think, revealing whether this was just something that went wrong on a personal side. I don't know what is going on. I'm suspicious that we've seen the last of Frankie Perez, and the fact that he got $50,000 as a bonus at the end of this, or maybe that he can encourage his decision-making. Yeah, I texted him this morning just to see if he changed his mind after sleeping on it, and he said, no, man, I'm done, which is amazing. I mean, wow, good for him.

has a DJing career and I think his family has a clothing line and all that stuff. So clearly he's got other things going on, but I mean, that's one of the more... There's definitely a record scratch moment in that. Wow, well done. Well done. Very impressed once again with Valéry Letourneau, Quebec's own, who all of a sudden couldn't speak English inside the cage, another bizarre. Poor John Anning. You were needed in that cage, Ariel, after you must have been just ripping your hair out. John Anick, man, it's amazing. I love when he's doing the shows, only because I know it's almost a guarantee that we're going to get some wacky post-fight interviews, and he handles it very well.

So she wins, and it's amazing. You look at her record, and this is someone who, you know, she kind of flew under the radar when she came into the UFC because she didn't do well in the ultimate fighter. She lost in the fight to get into the house against Roxanne Mata Ferry. So, you know, you don't really know what to expect. But now she wins her third in a row in the UFC, fourth in a row overall. And you start to really examine her record, you know, prior to this, fight winning streak, her last loss was to Claudia Gidea Gidella, which is amazing. She's the number one contender. And then you look at her other

two losses, Alexis Davis and Sarah Kaufman, in 2007. So a very long time ago. And this got me thinking about something that some fans were bringing up online on Friday with the Holly Home, Ronda Rousey fight coming up and the co-mate event we hope is going to be Yaneh on Jacek

against Gidelia. Do you think the UFC can get away in 2016? It'll be January 2nd, 2016, with a five-fight, all-women pay-per-view card. You throw in a look to or no, perhaps a Rose Namibunis, some other name, Amisha Tade, obviously against maybe an Amanda Nunes. Can they get away with this? Or do we, who live in this bubble, think a little too highly of Women's M.A. In the sense that I think that M.MA is still new to a lot of people, and then women's M.M.A. is a whole other beast. Do you

think that'll be too risky for the UFC? Not if you're headlining it with Ronda Rousey. I think that with Ronda Rousey on top, it's an experiment on. It's an experiment on would go forward with if you've got that fight involving Ronda Rousey on top. It's something different, which I think with all the fight cards that the UFC is promoting every single year, a different is good for once in a while

on a pay-per-view, something novel, something that's going to get them different kind of attention as well. I think the Ronda Rousey opens your doors, and here it is the UFC which is largely to the outside presented as very much to this alpha male promotion, and here is something completely different. I think it's

an experiment worth doing, and I think that you're still going to do significantly well with the right fight on top involving Ronda Rousie. What do you make of the UFC's decision to go with Holly Home as opposed to Misha Tate, who was promised the title shot in July in Chicago, or Amanda Nunes, who's coming off an amazing win over Sarah McMahon? Here's my biggest problem is just this inconsistency. We've got these rankings, and I'm not someone that just complains about the rankings for the sake of it, But if you're going to present your defense for certain title fights, such as Alexander Gustafin, jumping Ryan Bader,

Chad Mendez over Frankie Edgar, what was cited? Well, they're ranked ahead of the other guy. That's why they're getting the title fight. So don't give me that line. And then we turn around and we're getting fights like Carlos Condit, challenging Robbie Lawler, and Holly Holm just jumping all the way above Amanda Mniz and Misha Kate. My bigger problem with everything was how it was hands.

handled with Misha Kate. Because I've heard no argument of why the U.S.C. had to do things the way they did. Other than, it just sucked. Like, Misha Tate could not even get a phone call. This is, this is these fighters' lives, that they are scheduling the rest of this year and the next number of months geared around this fight that they were promised. Probably easily, the most money Misha Tate would make in her entire life up to this point for that third fight with Ronda Rousey.

and to have to find out the way she did, I just think that was terrible. It's a great point. I spoke to her manager, Josh Jones, on Friday morning, so around 10 a.m. Eastern time or so, and he was living. This is a really nice guy, calm, cool, collected guy. He could have been. Yeah, and he said, I was absolutely shocked. And he told me, we're speaking right now.

Misha Tate is in, I believe she was in Vegas, either Vegas or Seattle. She has no idea. She's sleeping. I've called her. I've texted her. She has no idea. Both you and I know about this. before her, which, I mean, I feel like Misha Tate has a pretty great relationship with the UFC,

and I can kind of understand them not wanting to, you know, tip her off because of a big announcement, Good Morning America. That's a big deal. I get it. But I feel like Misha Tate would have kept it quite. I mean, she would have been upset, but they would have made it right. She wouldn't have gone on Twitter and spoiled their announcement. She would have been pissed off.

I don't blame her. But to not tell her or her team seems like a crummy way to go about things. And, you know, I think that it's, look, I get the decision. That's why I hated the fact that they, you know, that she was the number one contender in Chicago because I wanted to see where where things would lie in the next few weeks. I get the decision. It's a sellable fight. You know, here you have, the UFC is trying to market and position. Ron Rousey is this big star to the ESPNs of the world, to the cat, to the, to like the cosmopolitans of the world.

And to say that she's fighting someone a third time who she has already defeated twice is a hard sell. And, and then when you say, okay, here she is fighting this fellow undefeated fighter who's a world champion boxer multiple times. She's been in this board. that's an easier sell, I think, to the mainstream sports world and not sports world. To say you're going to fight Amanda Nunes, who's won her last two in a row, that's a tough sell, and plus she can't really speak English all that well. So I feel like they're going with what makes the most sense for the casual audience. I get the decision, but again, as you just said very well, you can't promise her a shot in July.

You cannot tell. I mean, that's just not the right way to go about things. I would say that the audience that Ronda Rousey is bringing in today, I think very few are, obsessed over the competitive nature of the opponent. And I think we're coming off of a fight where that was compounded, if that was your thinking going into it with Betch-Coheah. I think

Nisha Tate, the argument is, I mean, in terms of opponents, she's beaten, there's no question. She deserved this over Holly Holm. Second, I think that, you know, I go back, and in 2006, I mean, we were both following this, and when they announced that second and even third

fight involving Ken Chamroff and Tito Ortiz, is the same dialogue. that, man, this is such a stupid fight to make. And despite the competitive imbalance growing and growing from fight one to three, the business was the complete opposite. And I think that there are new fans watching that didn't watch the first fight, maybe saw the second fight. But this third one, you would at least have someone initiated that a lot of people are familiar with,

that will be going out there, will be doing the media rounds. I think it is a fight that you almost can't go wrong with an opponent for Ronda Rousey. At this stage, it's just that big. So if I'm Nisha-Kate, though, what is my ceiling now in the U.S.C.? What do I have to do? The argument was, well, it's a third fight with Ronda Rousey. Is her beating Amanda Nunei is going to change that fact? Is this something you weren't aware of when we were continuing to book her?

But what is the past from Nisha-Kate in this women's division that the title fight is going to be withheld from her because of past performances? Final quick question. UFC 194 super stack 195 it's got Ronda Rousey which does better on pay-per-view in your opinion between UFC 194 and 195

yeah I've got to say at this point I am I'm leaning towards 195 because every single fight this year that Ronda Rousey has been in it is just blown away my expectations going in so I kind of

leave that fight to that final week who knows how big the fight is going to become. I mean, they're both great cards, but Ronda Rousey has just surprised me so much in terms of how big her pay-per-views have become that I have to

lean that way because each show has been bigger than the last. Great stuff, John. Appreciate the time, especially after a very busy night. Catch them on the Fight Network, if you're in Canada. Their coverage is amazing. Also, one of his 4,000 podcasts, you can get them on iTunes, Live Audio Wrestling, review away,

all that good stuff, and more. Appreciate it, as always, John. We'll talk to you soon. Anytime, Ariel, thanks. All right, there's my fellow Canadian, John Pollock. We were just talking about UFC 194. Last week on this show, I said, that card has the greatest co-main event in UFC history, the greatest. And you've had a week to argue against that point, and you brought nothing to the table. One half of that co-main event is Luke Rockhold.

He joins us right now. Be the Magic of Skype, there he is. Luke Rockhold himself, what did you make of John Pollock over there? Our first guest of the day saying 195 is going to do better on. on pay-per-view than 194. Do you agree? I tend to disagree. What can I say? It might be a little biased, but, you know, I'm leaving our card a little more. Do you agree that this is the greatest co-main event in UFC history? Also, you're biased,

but, I mean, I think that's a very valid point. I'm going to have to go with that one, too. Yeah. Why not? Are you disappointed that you're the co-main event? No, I'm happy to be on this card in this situation. It's a great opportunity for me. and I'm just going to do what I do. Before we get into the actual fight, I have a very big question, a very important question

to really kick things off here. And please be as honest as possible, okay? Did you get Taylor Swift's phone number? No comment. What do you mean, no comment? What is that? You can't go on Instagram, take a picture with her,

you're all chummy, and you just said you were going to be honest. Why can't you tell us? What's the big deal? If you got the number, you're the coolest guy in the world. if you didn't, well, then you're just like everyone else. No problem.

Exactly. So I'm just going to leave it as is. How did Luke Rockhold get to meet arguably the most famous pop star in the world right now? How did this happen? No comment. What? You can't even tell us that? You can't even tell us how you got the picture?

Daniel Cormier is on his Twitter, flaunting that he's hanging out with Stone Cold Steve Austin. Very cool. But you won up him with Taylor Swift. You got to tell us the backstory here. I just got some connections and it was one of those why nots going to Taylor Swift. I was a little scared. I didn't know the exact demographic I'd be entering into.

But I had the opportunity to meet Taylor and say hi and plant the seed. So, you know, baby steps, but we might be on the right track. You never know. Wow. So we had... Mind you, Kormier was supposed to go the next night. There was a back-to-back shows. Okay.

And he actually got scared and bailed out. His little daughter wanted to go, and he pulled a plug. Scared of what? You know, I think a real man can go to a Taylor Swift concert and try to enjoy himself. He may just got a little scared, you know, what can I say? I have no problem with that at all. Was she nice lady? Did she know who you were?

She was nice. Connor had Chenato Connor sing him out. Could you imagine Taylor Swift, shake it off as you're walking to your title fight? I thought about it. I envisioned it. Tom Petty was a Taylor Swift. Oh, my Lord. This would be amazing. 194 would be gigantic if you got Taylor Swift to say. Wydenman gets Tom Petty, you get Taylor Swift, and you can't beat that.

It would be pretty hard to beat. Okay. Is Sheney O'Connor coming back? That's the question. Is she going to come back in the sweatpants and do the whole deal? I don't think you can go back to that well. I think it's one and done. You want to see it again? I mean, it worked for him last time.

I don't know. We'll see. Where else is he going to go? How's he? I mean, you can't really go back from there. Yeah. Maybe they do something different, a different kind of entrance, but I don't think you bring out the live music again, but that's just me.

Okay. So last week on the show, we had Chris Wyman, right? He opened the show and he had some very interesting comments about you. I just want to quickly play you a snippet of what he had to say about you and get your response, okay? Here's Chris Weidman last week on the show. I'm excited to go out there and just

completely run through Luke. I really just really cannot imagine myself losing them. And I know he'll kind of talk the same way, but I think he's just, I think he's just kind of fake, and I don't think he really even believes he could be it. Really? Why?

But he knows what, he knows what to say. I just think he knows. I just think he knows. These guys know in the way. I think they're starting to get it. and he's one of the guys who knows. He's like, I think he's a little insecure with himself. And I feel like that's why he has to pop his chest up all the time and go a little overboard.

But I think he's just insecure and I think he knows what's coming. I think he'd much rather be fighting anybody else besides me. Luke, this is heavy-duty stuff. Much rather be fighting someone else, insecure, you know. What'd you make of his comments? I really don't know what he's gone through his head. I believe what is his psychology major, right? So maybe he's just, you know, messing with himself.

I don't know. He's built these things up. I don't know what he's reading into, but he's about to wake up to a different story come 12-12. I like that, 12-12. But, you know, you could say a lot about an opponent leading up tough fight. I mean, he's going into a special place here. He's kind of trying to get into your mind saying that you're insecure. Why do you think he's bringing these things up?

and where is this coming from? Honestly, his delivery and his words surprised me greatly last week. Yeah, his delivery sounds like he's sleeping, like he's in bed trying to talk to. But I don't see where he's seen weakness in my game and what I've brought to the table. I've been through some tough battles in my career, and he's seen a lot of those in the past in the strike force days.

And I think I've proved myself even more so. now. So I mean, people haven't seen the wars in the UFC that I've had in strike force and what I'm capable of and where I can dig deep. And I just don't know where he thinks he's going to break me. I think he's underestimating every part of my game. And he's going to, he's going to be surprised when he tries to wrestle and, you know, I'm shutting him down everywhere. And and I believe we're going to, this ultimately probably end on the feet. I'm, I don't see what he brings the table. He's fought a bunch of the guys that are scared of him. He's fought a a one-legged spider, a fireless dragon, and an old lion with his balls cut off. I mean,

this is a, he's placing a different animal at this point in time, and I'm going to bring it to him all levels, and I'm going to shut them down. You know, sometimes when someone goes in a direction like that, sometimes, I'm not saying this is the case right here, but I want to get your opinion on this, when they take these kind of shots, when they, when they dig deep like this, it's almost like they're talking about themselves, but they're trying to deflect how they're feeling about themselves onto someone else. Do you feel like that's the case here?

I mean, it could be. It could be one of the, you know, how he's looking at it. I think he knows he's in for a fight. He's known this was going to be one of his, a fight a long time ago, and it's finally here, and he's just trying to build himself up any way possible. You know, he keeps comparing our V-Tor-Belfort fights. that's a bad way to look at things. We fought different guys on that night.

I got caught by a crazy kick, and he got caught by an old, you know, old saggy detour and still almost got him. I just don't, if you want to compare a fight, you can compare him a cheetah fights. We fought a pretty similar machita. I think he was, he came back, almost got Wyman, had a nice showing against CB Dolly,

and then, you know, came back in with a lot of confidence, and a lot of hype behind him, and I completely shut him down. Weidman couldn't barely hold him down at times, and you saw what I was able to do to him. I'm just getting warmed up in his game, and I'm looking forward to this fight with Wyman. I really think he's going to bring the best out of me. He's a tough guy. He's able to take some shots, and I'm going to be able to get loose and start letting my stand-up go, and he's going to be shocked when he can't take me down.

I guarantee he's going to try to take me down. He might get me down for a minute. I'm going to bounce back up. I'm going to start shutting down all this takedowns, and I'm going to start doing my thing on the feet and start teem off like Tiger Woods. Has a line been drawn in the sand here because I've seen you guys in the same room.

I've seen you guys do media together. You always seem like you were pretty good friends. But something, you know, like even now, you're not smiling. You seem kind of annoyed to be talking about this guy. Something seems to have changed in the last few weeks. You know, it's all fine and dandy until you start fighting for the belt.

You start, you know, someone's got to take the other guy's dreams. And everything has worked for us whole life. It's going to get personal. It's going to get more personal as it gets long. This is, you know, it's time for war. How have you been able to stay focused and not over-trained for this fight? You last fought in April. I know you were ready to fight around September or so.

It didn't work out for him. His wife is having a baby, and the timing just didn't work out. So here you are fighting in December. I think in the end it will be beneficial for both of you because you're on this gigantic card at the end of the year. But, I mean, I see you. I follow you on Instagram and Twitter and all that stuff. You seem like you're in pretty good shape and you seem like you're in the gym all the time. So how do you not overtrain and get too pumped up for a fight that as we speak right now is a little less than four months away?

That's a long time. It's a long time. You've got to, you know, space it out. I've been training more so than I usually do like this far out. I'm harder than I usually do. but, you know, as long as I fit in the right, you know, Taylor Swift concerts and the, you know, in Bert's family last weekend. So I managed myself and I free myself up on the weekends and do some things.

So I have a little Paris trip coming up and a couple things. And we're going to do some promos. There's going to be a lot of promotional work to, I'll stay busy. I'll stay on the grind. But, you know, I've got a good, I've got a good outlook at my training and my lifestyle this point. You know, I've been in the game for a long time. What's going on in Paris? We have a thing for Adidas we're doing out there.

We're going to go to the factory out there, and I'm going to do a seminar and enjoy myself a little bit. You big over there? I don't know. What we're about to find out. Is TS going to? T.S. Yeah. Maybe you'd answer if I refer to her as T.S.

That'd be something, huh? Come to Paris to me. She'll take you on. Almost that. You're not quite there at your relationship just yet. Yeah, we're taking the 1989 world tour all the way up. You were recently on Long Island, right? What were people saying to you?

Did people come up to you and say, beat our guy? Did they boo you? Did they spit at you when you were there? Because you were on his turf, even tweeting at him saying that there you are hanging with the people. You'd be surprised how many people came up to me in Long Island and said, please be Chris Wyatman. Get out of here. Really? I swear to God.

I swear to God. We had a good showing. And I got a lot of support out there. It felt good. and I was hanging with the people, you know, and we had a good time. And, you know, I got a, let's just say I got a lot of, I got a lot of Long Island people coming up to support me on this. Really?

What are they saying? I just said, what I was saying? They, they, they, a lot of people just talk like Chris. I don't know. I swear, I do, I don't, I tell, I tell no lies. Okay, speaking of lies, he claims that Daniel Cormier writes your tweets. There's not been one tweet written by Daniel Cormier in the history of, of my Twitter.

He doesn't act to Twitter and write your stuff. He's underestimating my Twitter game. He's underestimating my stand-up game, my wrestling game, and my jihitsu game. So, you know, these, uh, whatever. He can keep,

you can keep telling himself these things, but he's, like I said, he's in for a rude awakening. When you see what happened to Kane Velazquez, and, you know, it's part of the game. Your buddy, uh,

Cormier recently became champion. He has a fight coming up, but then the flip side is what happened to Kane. You're right there. I mean, You are at the mountaintop, my friend. You are one win away from becoming a champion. How do you prepare for this?

How do you mentally get ready for this? As opposed to the Luke Rockhold who was coming in to the UFC against Vitor Belford? Like, is this Luke Rockhold perhaps a little more humble and saying like, oh, you know, bad things can happen as opposed to that one who thought maybe he was on top of the world? He was the strike force champion because you have both sides of the coin right in front of you. Yeah. I know I'm going to fight these days and if it's not broke, don't fix it. Vitor kind of took a lot of the weight off my shoulders with that fight. It was I carried a lot into that fight and that just helped me relax and focus on nothing.

We're just relaxing, really. I think that's the key of my success as of late is just ultimate relaxation and not carrying, not holding on to winning or losing and just going out there and believing in myself and believing in my preparation and my camp and everything I bring the table. I know I'm a better fighter and then all these guys. anything can happen, of course, in the game, and it is what it is, but I'm better than any metalweight in the world right now. I guarantee you that, and I'm going to win 99% of the time. Why not 100% of the time?

Because, you know, it's the game it is, but, you know, trust me, I'm going to go in there. I'm going to dominate this fight. I'm going to show that I am the best fighter in the world. Are you going to bounce around leading up to this? I saw you training with Henry Hooft in in Florida. I've seen you other places as well. What's going on there? Are you just trying to figure out you know, what's best for you, or do you have relationships with these guys? What's happening? Yeah, I've always respected Henry Hooft and what he brings to the table. We've always kind of got along and wanted to work with each other. He wanted to work with me and I wanted to work with him. And, you know, I so happened to be out of Florida and Vitor so happened to be out of the States.

And, you know, I jumped in and jumped on the stomping grounds and took over. So, no, I just, I try to get knowledge wherever I can. You know, if I see you. something I like. I want to work with him. I'm not, you know, I'm one of those guys that I'm trying to learn from everywhere and everybody. You got to have that mindset. I think, I think Wyman's is sheltered in his own world with Ray Longo, and he's only going to get so far. You know, it's for myself. I work with everybody I can that I, you know, I see something in. And, and, you know, I can be more innovative like that and learn little tricks and things that I can add to my arsenal that the Wyman will not see.

Do you see improvement in Wyden's game? Like when you watch the Wyatman who, you know, let's say fought Munoz, then Anderson twice, Machita, and most recently Vitor, do you think he's getting better? It's, yeah, I think he's getting a little better, maybe a little more relaxed. I still see. He still looks clunky and slow and weird. Like, you know, these kicks he's throwing, I don't know what he's thinking. If he tries to pull that stuff off of me, I'm going to make him pay for every dumb kick he throws. I mean, really, he might be a worse kicker than Bisbing.

not even lying right now. He's pretty bad in that department. I'm looking forward to getting in there and mixing that up. I mean, I just, I think he's, I think he's confident. I think he gets by on his grit and his toughness that he comes forward, and these guys are kind of scared of getting taken down and holds him back and he can get off with his striking. I'm going to, I'm going to meet him in the middle. I'm not going to worry about the taketown. I will defend the takedowns. And I'm going to make him pay. I'm going to cut angles. I'm going to be slicker. I'm going to be faster. I've got more. weapons, I'm going to hurt this dude in every way. And if it gets the ground, I guarantee I will

have, I'll be superior in every area of this fight. You watching a lot of tape on him? Are you that kind of guy? I've watched a lot of tape on him for a long, long time, and I watch more. I definitely study and try to build my instincts, and so it just comes out naturally. And I've really, yeah, I've watched every fight a lot. So have you allowed yourself to dream about December 12th? 12-12? Do you have a specific outcome way to an outcome that keeps popping up that you see this actual fight going down? You always envision certain areas of the fight where you can finish it, and it usually plays out that way for me almost every time. Like I've said it before, I really think Wyman's going to come forward. He's going to try to wrestle. He's going to try to pressure me. I'm going to stop him. I'm going to hit him with everything I got.

and he's going to, you know, he'll probably try to take me down. I guarantee you I'm going to threaten him. I'm going to probably put some kind of submission or get back up, and he's going to panic. We're going to get back to our feet. And then I'm going to start finding my groove on the feet and cut them off. And it comes forward very strong at the beginning. But when you hit him with something, he's trying to back it up

and playing that middle ground game, that's a game where he's going to lose. And I'm going to find him. I'm going to catch him with something clean. It's going to be a left kick or a left hand. I'm going to say left kick or left hand. One of the other is going to slow him down. What do you think of my Magic Johnson and Larry Bird comparison? East versus West, two young studs.

You guys like each other, but there's no person in the world that you would rather beat more. You can't lose to this guy. It feels like that's what's developing here, like two guys in their prime, peaking at the right time from different coasts going toe to toe in one of the greatest, you know, content. I mean, I can't say enough good things about this fight. Do you feel where I'm coming from with this? It's going to make a good fight. I'm excited for it. He's definitely a Larry Bird, a little clunkier version.

But, you know, a strong-minded, you know, confident guy. You know, I'm going to throw the magic. You're a little showtime, right? I'm going to bring the magic to the table, and we're going to take over. Can you just do me one favor? Can you not surf or do any of your stupid things? I mean, when you're cracking your head open? I mean, can you just keep it on the deep?

for the next four months. Please, I don't want to see anything happen to this damn fight. Yeah, that's going to be good. I'm healthy. I'm very conscious of what I'm doing in my body and taking care of it. Trust me, I'm not running any risks on this fight. This is something I've worked for my whole life and I'm not going to let it slip to my fingers. All right. Great to hear. Good to have you on the show again. Yes, please, tell me. I will not be the guy that gets injured on this fight. I guarantee you that. Okay. We'll hold you to that. Say hello to Taylor for us. Do you want to sing us out. Any specific tune? Anyone that you like that really stuck with you that night at the concert?

Anything at all? No, I'm good. You're good? Okay, fair enough. Can't wait. Honestly, I cannot wait for this fight. I don't know if I'm more excited for any other fight the rest of the year. Luke Rockhold, Chris Wyman, UFC 194, December 12th in Las Vegas. It's going to be great. Luke, appreciate the time. Best of luck to you. We'll talk to you soon. Thank you. There is. The one and only, Luke Rockhold, a staple over at the American Kickbox. boxing academy. I mean, tell me, there are certain fights that are just as good. Conor Aldo is just as good. I mean, it is, it is an amazing fight. Cruz Dilashah is just as good. There's no doubt about it. That is an amazing fight whenever they announce it.

There are other fights that are great. Romero Jacare, that was announced Monday afternoon after our show last week. Seroni dosangios is a tremendous fight. Condit Loller is a great fight. But there's no fight that I'm looking forward to more than Rockhold Weidman. God, I can't wait for that fight. Rockhold Wadman, December 12th. It's going to be great. All right. In a minute.

Let me just alert the masses here. Why I keep doing this, I don't know, but I do it. We're going to be joined by the Executive Vice President of World Series of Fighting. Mr. Ali Abdallah-Aziz, very busy man. My opinion, one of the most powerful men in mixed martial arts. That's right, I said it. One of the most powerful men in the game today. And he has alerted me that he has some interesting news to break on the program.

He'll be doing that in a matter of moments. He's joining us from Las Vegas. World Series of Fighting has a show coming up in September. They're doing Justin Gaichi, the lightweight champion. Rematch. Also, I think Nick Newell is on the card. Yeah, that's right. Nick Newell is on the card.

and David Branch going for the light heavyweight title, right? Could be a dual champion. That's coming up. But we're not necessarily talking about that on today's show. We're talking about other news that Mr. Abdel Aziz wants to break on his favorite program, the MMA hour. He joins us right now via the magic Skype. Ali, how are you, my friend?

I'm doing great, man. How are you, Aria? Who else is joining us? I see an arm over there to your right. That's the mystery guy. Okay. Well, you know, I see a, what's going on over there? A fight card in back of you?

What's happening over there? Yeah, yeah. This one has been announced already. Okay, that's not. Okay, I'm not excited about that. Okay, you have told me, Ali, you called me up, very, very important, and you're a very hard guy to reach. You know, I try to call you, I try to text you, you don't respond unless you want to talk. And you reached out to me late last week and said, Ariel, my brother, as you like to say,

I have some news that I want to break. And I have some very, very interesting news that I want to break on your program. So let's get it out of the way. The floor is yours, my friend. What do you want to tell the world? First of all, we talk a lot. Come on. One second here, let me fix something.

You look great. Okay. Thank you, brother. No, you know, as I said, where it says, fighting is doing things different. We want to do things different. You know, everybody put on shows, and we just want to do something different.

And me and my man Ray Seffo come with this idea. As you know, Ray Seffel, all he did in K-1 tournament, you know, the K-1 tournaments and prior tournaments, and this is something old school people love. And he was going to sit down and we talked about it and we'll come up with his eight-man tournament. It's going to be a lightweight eight-man tournament. It's going to be a tournament champion at the end of the night. and the tournament champion will get to fight the winner of Palamino and Gesi in the lightwave match.

So it's a one-night tournament? It's a one-night tournament, yes. Eight guys. So the winner is going to have to fight three times that night, right? The winner will fight three times, correct. The winner will fight correct three times. And it's going to crown an tournament champion. Okay.

It's kind of going back to the gladiator days, you know. One gladiator fight, and he keep going and keep going and keep going and keep going. After that, he achieved his ultimate goal just win this tournament. I think fans should be excited about it because, you know, there's so much MMA out there, people getting kind of tired a little bit. You know, so many shows. It's true, you know. It's good for the fan, hardcore fan, but when you have an eight-man tournament,

you want to sit in front of TV and watch to see which Gladiator is going to win the tournament and which one is going to wrap his knee and go back to the second round. After that, he's going to ice his eyes from swollen. and go back and fight this other gladiator and one tournament, and you'll be a champion. And we have, you know, we have some really good guys going to be in this tournament. Tell us. Do you have the names? You know, Islam Mahmadov, he really fought for a serious of fighting.

He's 2-0. Jawal Zarafino, Rich Pachshnok, Makako, who got to bring some old school to it. Yes, of course. Listen, the guy is awesome. He still compete. Brian Cobb. Mike Ritchie.

And probably the winner between Lalu Barley and Brian Foster. He'll be in a tournament two. As you know, they fight in WSOF 23 in Arizona. And I'm going to have some kind of super fights on there for fun, you know. Jason High is going to fight Carl Fidor. Fidor. And I say, man, you know, we're going to have other couple good matches on there and we're going to have the way this tournament is going to work, we're going to have like the

undercard is going to be a reverse bout, you know? The reverse bout is going to be going on on the undercard and if anybody got hurt in the tournament in the middle of the tournament, they can go ahead and they can go ahead and, you know, replace if any guy got injured or getting them. I got caught or anything like that. Okay. You mean reserve bouts? Reserve bouts.

Reserve bouts. I know English is at your mother time. Yeah, it's not my first time. I know, but you're doing great. I appreciate it. When is this tournament? It's going to be November 20th. It's going to be live on NBC Sport,

and it's going to be in Seattle. Oh, wow. Seattle, Washington, yes. And the Washington Commission, are they okay with one-night tournaments? Because I know some commissions are a little, they're a little lukewarm towards them. We talked to the commission.

They're okay with it. We're just going to work, find some details. We'll probably have a phone call with them today or tomorrow. But, yeah, one guy is going to fight three nights. One guy's going to fight three times in one night. And we just want to do something different. You know, we're in a sense of fighting for the last three months. We've been kicking ass, put on this great fire card and, you know, bringing some big names back.

And we've built our talent. And one thing we do very, very well, built talent, you know. we don't use, you know, a lot of, you know, veterans. And we use some veterans, you know, we'll give them homes, but we like to build our own talents, you know, and as you see, Marlon Mariah, Justin Gishi, Lance Palmer, this is guy all made in World Series of Fame. You know, it's interesting that you say that because when you started, you know, you had And Jarolovsky and Rumble Johnson, and you were throwing out some of those

big names. And then I think you went away from that a little bit. and you started to develop more of your own talent. But last week, I mean, you had a pretty busy week. You had Mike Ritchie signing. You had Jason High signing. I mean, you had Colton Smith signing. I see his name up there as well.

So are you now going back to the original plan? Or, you know, like where do you stand? Because it definitely seemed like at first you were signing very big-named veterans. Then you stopped. And like I said, last week was a pretty busy week for you. Yeah, but as you know, Ariel, when we sign guys, I don't sign 50, 60 years or guy going to for us. guys when Anthony Johnson and

Andrea Alowski left, these guys they was number one contender in the UFC I don't sign guys just you know their career is very much done. Yeah. You know, I sign guys can be relevant. I think my reach is still relevant. I think Colton Smith, he moves up to

170, I think 155 was the wrong way division, you know, and he brings something different, you know, he brings the military behind him, he's a great guy and he called me and he asks for a home, you know what, and he's a friend and And if you are, you know, and he's a good fighter and he won the ultimate fighter, he's still young, you know, and if he asked me for a home, I give him a home. Jason Hyes, hey, the guy, you know, he got cut, but, I mean, I sure, you know, I don't think he sure got cut because a lot of drama was going behind him.

And I ask a lot of media even before I sign him, what do you think about me is Jason Hye? And everybody said he deserved a shot, you know. Carlos Friedor, he went to one FC and he got two wins. He's still a young guy. He's still a guy I can develop. I got guys like Justin Geishi. He's running through everybody. I need some contender for him.

I can't just be protection, Justin Geci, and just give him, you know, guys, nobody know who they are. I got to give him, if you want to make his name so big, I got to bring the Jason High. I got to bring the Mike Ricci. I got to bring it as guys because this guy is a veteran. And if Mike, you know, Justin Geese is for real, and I know he is for real, he should go, you know, beat his guys

and retain his belt. or they're going to beat him. You know, I've got to give our champion challenge. So are you going to do this tournament thing, which I think is, you know, in this day and age, as you said, there's a lot of MMA. It's tough to differentiate yourself with so much, you know, UFC going on, so much Bellator. And then you have you guys on NBCSN, the one-night tournament, which Bellator is doing on September 19th, but it's only with four men. You're doing eight men, so, you know, it's one more fight. That's a big deal. Is that something that you're going to keep doing in other weight classes, or is it just a lightweight thing right now? You know, we got those probably maybe once two thousand a year.

And listen, if anybody understand eight-man tournament or 16-man tournament, is Ray Seffo. He fought in so many tournaments. I don't know. It was all my respect to any other promoter. None of this promoter out there understand eight or 16-man tournament, because they don't understand the feeling of it. They probably did it, and they was okay with it.

But when I have the guy next to me, Ray Seffle, he competed in it. You know, yeah, you know, and I can't come up with the idea, but listen, I didn't come up with the idea doesn't exist. He did it, you know, and he helped me so much with it, and he really put a lot of importance to this. And when I have a guy like that, you know, next to me, he competed in a tournament.

I competed in Julu, I understand the tournament for a not very well. This is a road tournament. You know, this is a road tournament. This is when when you win this tournament, the whole entire world is going to be like, wow, this guy did it, you know, because he's going to fight three big names in the tournament, and

people respect that. Do you have the matchups? Do you know who's going to fight who in the first round? It's going to be seating. It's going to be seating. It's going to be seating number one. It's going to fight number eight. Number two is going to fight number seven.

It's going to be seating. And, you know, and listen, the winner is going to make some really good money. It's going to be worth it. But do you know the seatings right now? You know, yeah, I know some of the seating, yes, yes. I do. Can you tell us? Islam Ahmadarraf, probably seated number one.

Jawaws are a phenoc seated number two. Number three, I'm not sure about it yet, but I can tell you, Rich Pachishnock, seven, McCock was eight, Brian Cobb is four, probably the winner of Brian Cobb and La Rue Barley is going to be five. Okay, what about Ritchie? Is he three then? I don't know.

He's going to probably be six. Okay. That's where Ritchie. You know, I'm kind of sharing this with you. Yes, I appreciate it. It's not finalized, yeah, but I'm kind of. I'm going to share it with you because you know what? You always been good to me.

Much respect. By the way, quick side notes, since we're speaking about champions, where do you stand with Palharis? Listen, Paharis did it to himself. He did it to himself and he kept doing it to himself. For him, I don't think he should think about fighting anymore. He should think about his will-being. He should think about his mental state.

The guy needs some help. I don't know what kind of help he needs, but he needs some serious help. I put my neck out there and I got smashed because I'm the one kind of signed him. And, you know, he did not make me proud. And it's just, you know, his management and his team, they've got to get together and they're going to be like, listen, how we're going to fix this kid his life. Not, not, man, not he's not a kid. You know, his life. Yeah.

I'm not even worried about him even fight a word says if he's a fight again. He might never fight again, you know. I want to see this human being do well in life because he's not. You know, you know, he needs to fix something. I don't know what it is. He's a great guy. I really like him a lot, but he got to fix something in his life. Not in his personal life.

He's just something wrong there. We all know what, but I'm not a doctor. You know, it's not my job to figure out what's wrong with the guy. My job is to put on a fight. You know, but if I was in his team and I manage him or care about him, I would take a completely different route with him. So are you done with him? Are you cutting him?

I'm not. No, I'm not, I'm not cutting him. Listen, you know, Pahars, he's one of the best Walter Wight in the world. He just finished fucking Jake Shield. If he didn't put, you know, and Jake Shields was one of the best. But I'm not going to cut him because if he go there and get some help and come back, said, listen, I'm healthy and it's going to be also going to put him through a lot of tests and probably going to send somebody to watch him train.

It's going to be a whole bunch of stuff. But I'm not going to cut him because I think, you know, I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do with your aerial, because right now I don't think Pahara deserve to go inside the cage. You know, it's nothing personal, but I can't have a guy going there to try hurt people. This is a martial art, and we are martial artists. You know, this is, you know, me and Ray, we are martial artists.

This is what we do every day, you know, but we just, you know, is an acceptable to what he did. His manager, Alex Davis was on my show and seemed very upset by the way the whole thing was handled saying that, you know, you came to the media first without telling him. It was illegal, all that stuff. Have you cleared the air, at least with him? Right, this is whatever Alex Davis said is bullshit.

Because, you know, we talked to them. I talk to Minotoro. You know, I don't care about Alex Davis. I talk to Minotauri his coaching. This is the reason why I signed him. I didn't sign him because Alex Davis, you know. And Alex Davis should be like, you know, be like, I understand. Let's get some help for this kid and move on.

He can be fucking going complaining. It should be issue of apology to Jake Sheel and his team. It should be like, you know, I'm sorry. I did not do my job and help Paharis. It's not Alex Davis's fault. It's not. You know, he's not his father. I don't know who's in charge of his life.

But, you know, I have nothing against Alex. But the whole thing is Alex should not be unhappy because, you know what? When nobody wants to give Paharis a home, I did. And I put my neck on the line for him, you know. But Alex, you know, he got to do what he got to do. but we did what we have to do and everybody agreed with us what we did.

And the whole thing is right now is the commission who's going to make the decision what's going to happen. I can say whatever I want about parts. The commission is going to come up with a verdict and we're going to go with it.

By the way, what's going on with your guy Frankie Edgar, going on Twitter today saying he wants Holloway Stevens. He's very vocal. What's happening? What's he going to get?

You know, Frankie's my little brother. Frank is going crazy, man. Frank is going wild. But, you know, I don't know. I think he just want to fight. He's not feeling the love. He will get some love. He'll get some love.

But I think he's going to get some tough love. But he'll be right. I saw a picture last week of you dining with the big bosses, Lorenzo Fretita and Dana White at the UFC, Fabrice Radume also there. Would you guys talk about at this dinner? We talked about a lot of stuff, man. We talked about a lot of stuff. talk about a lot of stuff.

You know, well, just, you know, these guys, Dana Lorenzo, I respect these guys. They pave the way for everybody to make money and have businesses. And it's always to sit down with these guys and, you know, talk about business and see what's the future of your movie is going to hold. Very nice answer. What did they say about Verdum and his future? I mean, he was there. I presume you talked about Verdum.

Co-co overdo you have his number he will answer okay so you're telling me if I call him up later on today he'll tell me what you guys spoke about he will answer he will answer but you know I want this call is about where it says a fighting okay okay let me ask you about this I know you get a little uncomfortable when I talk about the other guy that's fine you can talk about whatever

no problem I'm not uncomfortable you know a guy you said you stuck your neck out you signed Melvin Galard when he left the UFC now he's fighting in Belvoir he's main their show on Friday. Are you disappointed with the way things ended up with you? Because he pretty much asked for a release, right, from World Series of Fighting. One of the few guys that actually, it seemed like it ended poorly between you and the fighter. I don't think it ended poorly. I just think, I don't think, I think Melvin is, it's, it's, he's out of his mind, you know, the guy is,

you know, I don't really care about Melvin. Melvin is a, he's a, he's a UFC reject. He's a WSERF reject, now he's headline in Bellator made the event. Like, the guy he was talking so much shit. Like, when he left to the UFC, he's talking shit about the UFC. When he left where it says the fighting, he was talking shit about where he's fighting. When he's going to get cut from, you know, from Bellator

is going to talk about Billator because, you know, Melvin listen, Melvin is skill set. You know, it's, people evolve. People know what Melvin is, you know. And honestly, I'm so upset with Melvin because Melvin is, you know, after he, you know, he asked for the release and

Malky asked me and give him the release. And he's sent me a text message and say, thank you. I really appreciate it. But the whole thing is he's going on internet and talking about WSOF shit and UFC is shit. He is shit. Like, Melvin sucks. Like, Melvin, you know, is like, honestly, I think he's an explosive athletic guy. He's getting older.

He's not working with him. Like, listen, I, Melbourne, you know, we have some sparring session in the gym and Greg Jackson. And I beat Marvin every time. He's a world champion. Milvin is never going to be a world champion. Milvin is going to be a world champion of one thing. He tapped. That's what Merva does.

Jeez. You know? So, yeah, that's what he taught. He's a word chap of tapping because I do not appreciate when he left towards his fighting and we did not really have to release him and he was talking garbage, you know, and I don't appreciate that. You know, and I did it like a man, but what, Melvin, all he got to do is just match him up with a wrestler and he's going to take him down and finish him.

You know, that's how I finished him in the gym. And Greg Jackson was a witness of that. but I don't appreciate people come to you and ask for something when he granted to them and after that it seemed like fucking everybody's like leaving a promotion now

and I'm talking shit about the other promotion I have big problem with Josh Berkman I call Dana myself to get him a contract and me and Josh is cool and he was a man when he left to the words of the fighting and we had a problem

he was respectful because I wished him what he wanted you know I didn't really have to believe, I didn't have to believe Melvin, sorry, I didn't have to release him. Melvin, if he was a state of World Sisyphing, probably fight it on an undercar somehow. Now he's lying in the main event, but you know what? It's good for him. But, you know, I'm not worried about him. You know, even his coaches, his own coaches, you know, they was asking me, why are you not cutting this guy? He doesn't deserve to be a word Sissive fighting,

you know, but, you know, it's just a, he got a burden of a lot of bridges, but, listen, we have a lot of great things going on where's sysa fighting. The last thing I want to worry about is Melvin. We have a new CEO. He's making things here. We are in a light, man. We really are doing book things. We have fight card booked

to December the end of the year. We have the November. We have Phoenix. Justin Gishi Palamino. It's September 18. Yeah. September 18. And, you know, Justin Geish fought in Palomino,

David Branch fighting bodyholder. Phoenix Jones, the return of Phoenix Jones. and Brian Foster fighting on the main card. And we have also October 17 in your backyard, Connecticut. We have Jean Fitch O'Kami. Do you like this fight, Are you? I like it, yes. We got Belgoe Derek Mayman.

We got Vinnie Megalash, Grudge match with Matt Hamel. You know? And honestly, my job is so much easier now here because we have a new CEO is a very smart guy. He understands media. He used NBC on a daily basis. and things going really well here. We have our date for next year.

We sign in fighters. We're the only promotion seem out there signing talents. We sign in good talent who can belt up, become champions. You know? You know, our relationship with NBC's getting better and better every day. They're great guys. And I really mean it when I say that. And just we have a great sponsor.

We did alien wear, some nutrition, you know. And we have probably in the next couple of weeks something is going to blow everybody's mind. You don't want to deal with somebody. It's going to blow everybody's mind. You know, you know, you're going to be watching World Series and fighting everywhere. Okay. Well, I look forward to that. Let us know if you want to break that news on this show. For now, we have to say goodbye. You broke some very big news at the top of the interview. November 20th. You're doing a one-night, eight-man lightweight tournament. The winner, the winner of the tournament gets a title shot against the winner of Justin Gachie versus Luis Palomino, two, one of the very best fights.

of 2015 thus far. I look forward to that. It's in Seattle, Washington. Good luck in September in Phoenix. We'll talk to you soon, Ali. Great stuff as always. Thank you. Thank you for having him now. All right, there he is. The executive vice president of World Series of Fighting Mr. Ali Abdel-Aziz, bringing it strong to the hole. Holy moly. All right, let's move along. UFC 133, speaking of big events, I mean, this could go down as the biggest event of all time, biggest event of all time, at least for the UFC. And I mean, that is the gold standard right now. 70,000 fans they are hoping for it.

Eddie Hat Stadium in Melbourne, Australia. The main event is Robbie Lawler defending his welterweight title against our guest at this time. Carlos, how are you? I'm doing great. How are you doing? I'm doing great. Thank you for the time today. Wow, what an opportunity this is.

Did you have any idea? Because it seemed like the fight was announced or at least reported on before the 70,000-seats stadium and all that stuff came out last week. Did you know when you accepted this fight that it was going to be taking place in a stadium that big? Yeah, Dana, when Dana called and then confirmed that they were going to

give me the title shot, he told me that that was, that's what they were working on. And kind of the delay between when the rumor started and when the fight was officially announced by UFC was, you know,

the delay was caused by them trying to book that event center. And what was your reaction? I mean, this is a big deal. 70,000. I mean, they've had 55,000 once. They had almost 30,000 in Sweden, and then nothing close.

What was your reaction to that? It's exciting. You know, it's, you know, it goes without saying. It's a pretty exciting event. You know, I feel like, you know, this is a culmination of my entire career, you know, with, you know, in this big, big, big fight, big stadium, a massive event, you know, so it's definitely exciting. I know you're not one for, you know, a lot of talking, media, and all that stuff.

Does it make you a little anxious? Like, wow, I'm actually going to have to go out and sell this thing because 70,000, it's not like you're going to Vegas where it's 15,000 fans, you know, the tickets are expensive and all that. You still have to do some selling, but this is on a whole other level. Are you kind of dreading that? No, I'm not dreading it. I mean, it's part of it.

You know, Robbie and myself, I don't think either of us are big talkers. You know, hopefully we can, you know, draw enough of a crowd, build enough excitement just for the fact that we are exciting, top-level, you know, extremely violent strikers. And we are going to get in there. We're going to put on a fantastic show. after your win over Tiago Alves and what a performance it was what a way to come back after the layoff did you think that you had a chance to get a title shot after one win?

I thought that I had a chance definitely. I thought it was a little bit of a long shot but here we are. So were you surprised when you got it? Like did you think in the back of your mind it would be great but I probably have to go out there and fight at least once and what a surprise this is? Well, you know what? We started pushing for a title shot that night. Yeah. You know, sometimes it's, you know, it's what you, it's what you're out for. You know, aim high, shoot high, and, you know,

and maybe you'll get those things that you're wishing for, and that's kind of how it worked out this time. So as you can imagine, this news ruffled some feathers, namely Johnny Hendricks's feathers. He really wanted this title shot. Woodley to a degree. And of course, the Hendricks fight was a while ago. It was around over two years ago.

Woodley was around a year and a half ago. They both have wins over you, though. The Woodley one was a little weird. You obviously injured your knee. Do you see where they're coming from? Do you see why they're a little upset? Or do you feel like you have a better case than them? I can see where they're coming from.

you know, but I'm trying to get mine. I'm trying to get those big fights. I'm not worried about who I upset. You know, I don't think they should be upset with me. They should be upset with whoever, you know, who made the decision. You know, I'm trying to get in the biggest fights and, you know, and, you know, I'm trying to try to get the belts around my waist and, you know, you're not going to get the highest. actual line of the sport without stepping on some toes. Right.

Lawler's last fight against Warren McDonald was mind-blowing. I mean, it was just an unbelievable back and forth. He showed a ton of hard, finished him in the fifth round. Bloody, his lip was all messed up. Did you watch that fight live? And if so, how did you react to it? Like, knowing that there's a chance that you can fight this man, and you're the same kind of fighter,

you guys almost turn into zombies out there. Nothing can finish you. Did that, what you were like, wow, the opportunity to fight this guy sounds like the greatest thing in the world, or, you know, what do I have to do to finish this guy. How did you process what he did in the cage against Roy McDonald? Yeah, I watched it live, and I was blown away like a lot of people. It was an incredible

fight. You know, when I look at anybody in the division, that's always the question. You know, I'm always, I'm always impressed when I watch the fights. And when we signed about agreement, you know, the initial psychology first, you know, I'm always, I'm always impressed. me is, oh, man, you know, what did I get myself into? And how do I, how do I beat this guy? And for the first, you know, month, month and a half of training camp, it's, man, well, how are we going to beat this guy? You know, because everybody at this level is so good, so, so, so well-rounded, so technically sound. But as the, as the camp goes on, I get more confident and, you know, come fly week, you know, it's all over.

all the preparation's done, I just got to go out there and, you know, execute. And usually it works out for me. I know we're still around two and a half months away, but do you have an idea how to beat him now? Yeah, I mean, he's a man like anybody else. You know, he's got a, you know, he's got strength and weaknesses. And he's extremely experienced. He's super skilled. He's got great power.

But, you know, I, I'm figuring it out. I'm figuring it out. Are you a little surprised? Like, I feel like Robbie Lawler's resurgence from this, you know, I mean, he'd been around the sport a long time, but once, you know, the end of his strike force days were upon us, it just kind of felt like he was this mid-tier middleweight. He drops down to 170, and he's turned into a completely different fighter. I mean, you can't finish him.

He's going to distance with all these guys. He's more technical than ever. He's grittier than ever. I mean, the guy is just on a whole other level. Are you surprised by this resurgence? Did you see this coming? I certainly didn't. Well, you know, some guys have ups and down in their career.

And I know that this isn't the first time that we've seen somebody, you know, come back with a vengeance, you know, in what seems like the twilight of their career. You know, he's always been super talented. you know, he's got talent, and the guy is just a, he's a born fighter. You know, I really think that he's matured as a fighter. You know, I think, you know, some of those, some of those losses and some of that, some of the hardships maybe that he had in Stryft Force, you know, he grew from that. You know, it's not all about your successes.

It's about, you know, failing, falling on your ass sometimes. And then, you know, what do you do? Do you learn from it or do you let that diminish who you are as a fighter or as a person? The reaction to this fight, you know, sometimes when fans media think that a fighter is jumping over a couple of other fighters or one fighter, sometimes, you know, they bellyache. But the reaction to this fight seemed almost unanimously positive because of the idea of both of you, you know, in this phone booth going toe to toe and, you know, we know what you guys bring to the table, your resumes, your fighting style and all that. You know, it's an amazing thing because, like I said, if you just look at it on paper, you know, there are things that you can complain about. Did you get the same reaction?

Like when you were on, you know, social media and all that, did you get people kind of flipping out? Because that's what it seemed like. It seemed like everyone, including the media, turned into instant fanboys, just thinking about this fight. Yeah, I've got a ton of great response, great responses on, you know, on Twitter and on social media. I think that's why this fight makes sense. rankings-wise, yeah, maybe it doesn't. But this is the fight that people want to see. This is going to be an exciting battle.

You know, they know that Robbie and myself are both warriors. We're at the top of our game, and every time we step into Ocogon, we put on a show. And, you know, that's why the title fight makes sense. Was he one of those guys that you've thought about fighting for a long time, just because you have similar styles? Like, is this one that was kind of on your wish list for a few years? Well, since he's been back in the UFC and back at 170, I didn't think about it too much when he was at 185,

but, yeah, since he's been back, I've definitely, definitely been sizing him up and watching his fights and his performances. What's the vibe at the gym these days? Because now we have three, Albuquerque natives fighting for a UFC title in the next five months or so. You have Dotson coming up in September. Then it's you in November, and we just found out Holly Holm in January, plus, you know, big

fights for Andre Alofsky and a litany of others. What's the vibe these days at the gym? And cowboy. And cowboy, of course. Yeah, yeah. He's not an Albuquerque native, but a member of the team, of course. He's an honorary. He's transplanted.

Yeah. It's a great vibe. now. Honestly, we have a new facility, which is freaking badass. You know, a lot of people, a lot of people coming in. Yeah, the vibe is awesome. I think you know, these title fights could go either way, and I think all of us are underdogs, but, you know, that, you know, honestly,

I don't think that that means a whole lot. You know, I see at least a couple titles coming back to Albuquerque in the next five or six months. Does everyone kind of have a pep in their step because all these big fights are on the horizon? I don't know if that's what it is. Okay.

Or the new facility kind of there's a great vibe right now. What were you doing yesterday in the woods? I saw on your Instagram and all that that you spent the day in the woods. What was going on there? So we do, so Sunday days, we go and we get outdoors. We go do fun stuff, call it Sunday, fun day.

And we either go up to the top of mountains. I'm sure you've seen pictures of us training up at the Sandia Crest, they're like 11,000 feet. Yesterday we went up to the Santa Fe National Forest, which is about an hour and a half from Albuquerque, and then high elevation also. And, you know, did get some stuff up in the woods, trains some stuff,

did a bunch of, you know, balance and jumping and just had some fun, and then we hit pads and work some striking. It's a work day, but it's also, you know, kind of a recovery day. So, you know, it's interesting because your, you know, your shining moment in the UFC, I think came when you became, you know,

interim champion, but everyone wants to be the real deal champion, you know, no asterisk. But it was such a weird fight because it was the Nick Diaz fight, and you were so criticized for it. Like your entire career, you're this beloved, figure, beloved fighter, and then you have this one performance where, you know, it takes two to tango, we all know that, and you get this, this wave of criticism your way. Are you just relieved that you're getting a title shot, a real title shot, not an interim title shot, so that you can almost

wrong, excuse me, write that wrong, you can almost, you know, put that in the rear of you mirror, you can become a real champion, you become the full-time champion and not have to, you know, say that your one, you know, title victory in the UFC came on this night where for, for better or worse, you received all this criticism from people online? Yeah, well, for me, it's kind of, it's two different issues. The interim thing is something that I definitely would like to, you know, get rid of. I want to be an undisputed, legit UFC champion. You know, my, my belt, you know, they don't take the belt back.

I still have that belt and it's sitting in my son's room, and I want to, you know, I want that to be a legit belt. As far as the D.S. fight, honestly, I don't think, I don't think anything short of a rematch with him would, you know, would change things in anybody's mind, not that, not that I'm not worried about it. You know what I mean? I went up there and I got the win. And I don't know if I've said it on an air show, but I've told, I've said it in interviews in the past,

that I've agreed to that rematch a couple of times. I don't know if he's ever coming back, but yeah, I mean, I'm definitely, to answer your question, I'm definitely excited to get in there and get a chance to be the undisputed the UFC Welchway champion. If you win this belt, do you think the perfect scenario would be to fight him and put that to rest for once and for all? Honestly, I think I would rather fight

you know fighting the Dias comes with a lot of a lot of other stuff there's you know the fight in itself it's a tough fight it's a tough guy to to game playing against but to but uh the fans the social media aspect

and all that it's just I'd have to get my head right for that but you know of course I'm not looking past Robbie Laller but I you know if I get this if I get this

felt. I might like to avenge a couple of losses to the next couple guys that you had mentioned earlier. Right. Hendricks and Woodley. Who do you think wins that fight? You fought them both? I think, I think Hendricks, I just think, you know, Hendricks has been, he's been the distance in five-round fights. He's able to keep the pressure on. I mean, you know, Woodley, you know, he's.

He's a great fighter, and he's super explosive. But I think that if Hendricks keeps the pressure on him and doesn't let him, you know, explode and then rest, and explode in the rest, which is what he likes to do, you know, Hendricks will win the fight. Who wins, Holly Homer, Ronda Rousey? I don't know, man. I'm not counting.

I know a lot of people are counting Holly out, but I think that Holly has the style with her footwork and the distancing that she utilizes to actually, you know, stay away from Ronda. You know, she's, Ronna's fought great strikers in the past like Katz and Gano, but Katz style is a, you know, forward pressure, getting close, use knees and elbows, kind of Muay Thai style, which, you know, it didn't work out well for, for because she got, you know, she got within, you know, grappling range or plench range of Rhonda. Holly Holm, on the other hand, she likes to stay on the outside.

You know, she doesn't like to get in the pocket and, you know, where Rhonda would have the opportunity to grab her. So, you know, I definitely see why Holly the underdog, you know, I like Rhonda. I'm a fan. I think, you know, what she's done is off. awesome. But, you know, I think that, you know, if anybody has a shot at beating her, it's Holly. One last quick thing. Do you have to go to Melbourne for, you know, pre-fight media and all that stuff, and if so, when? And how many weeks or days before the fight will you go

come November? I do. I think we're headed out second week of September. We'll be out there for a few days. And then as far as going out to, for five weeks, I think, I don't know, I don't know, it could be up to two weeks before, depending on how much media they're going to have us do. But you're not worried about the time zone and all that stuff? No, I usually acclimate pretty easy. I always have a hard time coming back. My sleep schedule and everything's all messed up.

but, you know, any time that I fought overseas, I've acclimated pretty well. And I'm actually looking forward to that aspect of the fight. You know, I know that some guys have a hard time with, you know, with fighting, you know, fighting overseas, acclimating to time, you know, all that stuff. And I've done it so many times and it's successful so many times at it. I feel like that's an advantage for me. Well, can't wait for it. Appreciate the time, Carlos, as always.

November 15th. It's actually November 15th in Melbourne, but November 14th here in the United States. It takes place Sunday morning over in Australia, but the same pay-per-view time here in the U.S., Canada, all that good stuff. So nothing to really get acclimated to as far as North American MMA fans are concerned. They are shooting for the record, 70,000 plus at Eddie Hatt Stadium in Melbourne, Australia. And it's a fight that a lot of people I've been talking about for a long time, Carlos Condé versus Robbie Lawler. Appreciate the time, like I said. Best of luck to you in training. to it very much. We'll see you out there. Thanks, Ariel. Take care, man. There he is. The

natural-born killer himself. Carlos Condit, big fight for him, UFC 133. The majority of that card was announced last week. Mark Hunt versus Bigfoot Silva 2, arguably the greatest heavyweight fight in UFC history. That's a rematch of a fight that was somewhat marred by the post-fight drug test from Bigfoot Silva, so they get to do it again. Jake Matthews, also on the card. He's a young stud out of Australia. John Valante versus Anthony Perroche, Daniel Kelly on the card. Richard Walsh and Steve Kennedy

have a bit of a rivalry. Kyle Noak, also in Australian. And then the other big one, Robert Whitaker, going up against our guests at this time. The one and only Michael Bisping. Michael, how are you? Very well, thank you, Ariel.

Very well. Well, I appreciate the time. I know you were working last night, so you had a busy weekend. So thanks for carving out some time for us. Let me just ask you, let's get it out of the way, because I know you were...

Ariel, before we go any further, can I hang up and can you call me back? Because I'm getting some terrible feedback or some kind of noise down the line. So I do apologize. But would you mind calling me back real fast? We'll do it right now. Thank you, sir. All right. We are going to call Michael Bisping back.

I wanted to ask him right up the top about the stuff I spoke to John Pollock about the Frankie Perez stuff. You know, he was working as an analyst on the Fox set alongside Karen Bryant and Dominic Cruz. And, you know, as is often the case, you receive critical. when you're on TV speaking your mind and that's just part of the game and no one understands that better than Michael Bisping. There's no doubt about that. So I just wanted to ask him about that right off the top. And I said to him last week, he has turned into somewhat of a MMA darling after such a long career. It seemed like, you know, after his win over Tau's latest, a gritty win, a win in which

his teenage son was in his corner. It was just, it was just a great moment for him back in the UK in Scotland this time, the first ever UFC show in Scotland. He's won now two in a row. And it seemed like you know, there's always going to be those people that are going to not be a fan, but it seems like things have changed a little bit, certainly from the UFC 127 days. So he always keeps you on your toes, that Michael Bisping. And now, speaking of UFC 127, he's going back to Australia. Different circumstances this time around. And we talked about this on the beat, this booking. Now, I thought they'd go in the direction maybe of like a, a Viscay. tour Belfort, or, you know, who knows even Anderson Silva if he, you know, if Michael was

willing to wait until February, of course, now they, they know he's going to be out for a year, and maybe that wasn't ideal. But this one caught me a little bit by surprise. I do believe we have him back. Michael, are you there? Yeah, that's right. Is that better? Yeah, no, it is way better.

Sorry about that. I don't know what you're paying, those slugs that work for you. Yeah. But you need to up it to at least a minimum wage, Ariel. No way. They don't deserve it. Okay, so let me ask you about this, Michael, because I know you were talking to some people online about it,

so I want to address it right off the top, and then we can move on. The Frankie Perez thing, you're working. You get paid to speak your mind, and I appreciate that. Even if I don't agree with it, I like that you're being honest and you're not sugar-coating things.

Sure. Did people misunderstand you, or do you actually feel like, you look? Go ahead. 100% they misunderstand. Listen, I respect everybody that steps into the alt-gong because it's such a, It's such a hard thing to do for a living. And the world is made up of many, many different types of people.

And not everybody has what it takes to be a USC fighter, and that's just the fact of things. And if he doesn't want to do that, he wants to pursue another career, then great for him. And I really respect his choice to do that. And of course, that is his decision. My opinion, you know, being a fighter and a competitor, for me, that's the best living I can give my family.

That's the best way I provide themselves. I always struggle to understand why people say, I'm not going to do this for my family. For me, I'm willing to put myself through that for my family. This is my best opportunity. He got a $50,000 bonus last night on top of his wages. He probably has $70,000. You know, I don't know where else he's going to earn that type of money in one night.

Listen, it wasn't an insult. You know, it's just, you know, I don't necessarily agree. Good for him. I'm sure he's got a great head on his shoulders. and who knows he's got an illustrious career and something else away from fighting. I wish I had. And if he has, then God bless him and all the best.

Certainly didn't mean to be insulting, but my mindset, as a competitor, this is the best way I could provide for my family. And to be honest, not many people have this opportunity. He has that opportunity in front of him. He had a beautiful performance. He got a knockout of the night, and he's walking away.

For me, he just seemed a little weird, but good for him. God bless him. One last thing on this. you almost feel like you're damned if you do, damned if you don't, because we always want our analysts to speak their mind and be as honest as possible. At least I do, whether or not I agree with their thoughts.

And then sometimes, and you know this, I mean, it's no secret. Sometimes, you know, the Fox broadcast people are like, oh, you're shilling too much, you're too positive, you're trying to sell the UFC. Here you are saying, you know, look, you know, this, hey, that's his thing, more power to them, it's not my thing, and then you get heat for it. Does that discourage you at all?

I'm trying to give you an honest doubt. so that's why I'm calling. Do you get what I'm trying to say? Yeah, no, no, I do completely. To be honest, no, not really. I mean, Fox, the people that always encourage me to give opinions and to be opinionated, they don't want people to sugar-coded. Of course, you know, there's a fine line between being truthful

and being abusive, and they don't want anybody to be abusive for the sake of it. And I wasn't being. I was just saying, listen, I don't understand that mindset. No, it doesn't bother me, really. I've got very thick skin. I'm used to people not liking what I say. I'm 36 years old. I always not the first time it's happened.

Okay, fair enough. I figured you would say that. Okay, let's move along. Let's talk about Whitaker. I said while we were trying to reconnect with you that I was surprised by this matchmaking. Not for the market, not for the card. It makes total sense, given your history there

and his history there. But I thought after your win over Tows, ladies, you'd get someone like a Vitor Bellford in that range so that I think, you know, you win one more fight, you get the title shot. finally what you have been fighting for for so long, almost a decade, in my opinion the best fighter in UFC history to not

get a title shot. And I thought they were going to go in that direction. The time is now to do that, to steal that phrase. And they don't go in that direction. Were you surprised? Did you not like the booking either? You know what, to be honest, I was somewhat surprised. But then, now I've had time to let it settle in. You know, it does make sense. Obviously, my manager already at all

so I reached out to the UFC and Joe Sylvan, wanted a bigger name opponent. but the reality is that everybody's booked up, you know, and I don't like to sit on the sidelines and wait. I want to fight as frequently as possible. There's a big fight there, you know, at a stadium, first fight, first UFC event in Melbourne. Yes, he's not as highly ranked as I would like,

but he's still, you know, still a solid opponent. I think he's ranked number 12 in the world. He's on a three-fight win streak. He just knocked out Brad Tavares in 45 seconds. So for me, it's just about keeping the momentum going. Yes, it's not the market. them that I was looking for. It really isn't. But for me, it's an...

Hopefully, it will be another win on a good show, and I will still continue my march towards a title show. Do they need Michael Bisping now more than ever, especially for this card where they're trying to sell 70,000 seats? Because you look at Condit Lawler. They don't love doing media. You look at Bigfoot and Hunt. Same with them. And then we get to you and Whitaker. I kind of feel like you're going to have to carry this bad boy.

Michael? Apparently he doesn't want to carry the bad boy. we'll get them back. Technical difficulties coming out of Orange County. But I do think that is a valid point. Michael Visping is going to have to do a good amount of media. He's a big name. I definitely think that the market there,

like we can't even understand what's going on over there. You know, to us, I saw some people, you know, and it's valid from a North American fan perspective. You're saying, wow, this card is going to sell 70,000 seats. I'm not sure if it sells 70,000 seats in North America. But we can understand this is, this is, the other end of the world, and their draws are a whole lot more different than our draws, and their interests are different. And just the fact that the UFC is coming there for the first time

is, you know, is a draw in itself. The fact that those three letters are, you know, sitting up shop, that Octagon will be there after this long-standing ban in Victoria against cage fighting, that's a very big deal. That's a huge deal for the market. And sometimes just the UFC coming for the first time is enough. you don't need the biggest card for the first time. I mean, UFC 129 was a big deal. You know, I get it. And other cards were a big deal as well when they came there for the first time. But sometimes you don't really need that big deal.

What is going on over here? Is there something weird going on, you're quick? I feel like there was like some sort of power outage in the middle of the interview. Can anyone talk to me? Can you guys even hear me? Yes. Can we get Michael back? Wow. Okay, so no one can actually hear me right now, but it sounds like we have lost all connections. Someone continues to wreak havoc on this place on a Monday afternoon, which is incredibly exciting. I'm alerting Mr. Bisping of this horrible turn of events.

Live, I'm not actually talking to anyone, I think, but we are working on correcting this. issue. And like I said, I really think that the people who are criticizing this card don't really get what the UFC is dealing with over there. Everyone keeps telling me that Melbourne is this amazing market, especially when it comes to sports. They love sports more than anything over there. And they are so excited. I was at UFC 127, and that was a Sunday morning card. And that was a crowd was one of the loudest crowds that I've ever been to. And I've been to some loud ones since, but I recall sitting in the Acer Arena on a Sunday morning, no less, when Mark Hunt won, what else, Bisping won on that card as well. The main event was John Fitch versus BJ Penn ended in a draw.

But that crowd was unbelievable. And I feel, and that was Sydney. And now here we are in Melbourne. And everyone keeps saying that Melbourne is the sporting capital of the world, the sporting capital of Australia, blah, blah, blah, blah. I feel like they're going to react very favorably just to the UFC being there because they've been waiting so long. And credit to Tom Wright, who heads up the UFC's Canada office, New Zealand office, and Australia office. Credit to him, I mean, one of his first orders of business when he was hired was to get Ontario

done. And then he gets Ontario done. and their first show there is 55,000 plus a UFC 129 at the Rogers Center. And then, you know, he's doing his thing, and they've had successful shows in Canada. They had a really good one in Halifax. They had a pretty solid one last night in Saskatoon. And at the same time, he's trying to get things done in Victoria. That was the big draw in Australia.

And look what he's doing. He gets the ban lifted. There was a ban that they can't have cage fighting events in Victoria, in the province of Victoria. They could only have MMA fight cards in a ring. Got that ban lifted.

He's great with the politicians. Phil of Canadian, of course. So he got that ban lifted, and right away promised that they will bring a mega card, a gigantic card, to the area. And they've done just that. There was a report out that they were trying to do Ronda Rousey on that card,

but that's not the case. Of course, we know by now that she'll be fighting at UFC 195 against Ms. Holly home. Still trying to get Michael Bisping, I suppose. So I guess while we have some time, maybe we should just do the inside the vault. I don't even know if the guys can hear me back there.

Oh, you can hear me? Any sign of the internet? What happened? Did someone pull the plug on the whole building? Wow. So apparently what they're telling me here is that the entire building has lost power. Although there's lighting in here.

Maybe it's just internet and phone connection. Yeah, internet and phone connection. That is very disappointing. Yeah, screw inside the vault for now. I could talk a little bit about while we try to get Bispig on and hopefully we'll get them on rather quickly and then we could go to Dan Hardy, who has some pretty big news.

We also have Mike Winklejohn coming up and Ephrine Escadero, who I want to talk to about coaching the ultimate fighter Latin America. The Holly home Ronda Rousey booking was a fascinating thing on Friday to witness

because, you know, the UFC announced on Thursday that Ronda Rousey's going to be on Good Morning America to announce big fight news. No, they didn't even say big fight news. Excuse me. They just said big news. And it was, you know, okay, well, I think of, you know, what is she going to announce?

We kind of know that she's fighting Misha Tate next. So that's not a a huge deal. And I don't know, she's got some movies coming up, so maybe she'll do that. I mean, what kind of news would warn Wanda Rousey waking up at 4 o'clock Pacific time, right, to, you know, go promote or announce something on Good Morning America? So she does just that and drops the bomb that she's fighting Holly Holie Homme, not Misha Tate, not Amanda Nunes, not Chris Cyborg, which was a long shot and a pipe dream at this stage. until Chris Cyborg fights at 135 pounds, it's not a possibility.

Until she actually makes that weight in Invicta, I'd be very surprised if the UFC booked her in a 135 pound title fight. That's just the reality. So she comes on there and announces the Holly Holman. Once again, Ronda Rousey does a fantastic job of building up her opponent. And only she has to do that because, A, she's talking to people who don't know who her opponents are. and she just kind of gets it. She's just from that pro wrestling background where it means more to build up your opponent.

You know, if you build them up and beat them, then the win means more. If you make them seem like yesterday's news or garbage or not on your level, then the wind doesn't really feel as big. That was the case with Bechko Hea. That's what she did so well in that fight. By Friday night, people were like,

is Bechko Hea crazy enough to beat Ronda Rousey? She was certainly taking her serious. and, you know, people were, I think they were surprised. I think they forgot the fact or overlooked the fact that Ronda Rousey and M.M.A. fighter, a women's MMA fighter just went on Good Morning America as mainstream as it gets to announce a fight booking. She didn't announce anything else. She just announced a fight booking. That's unbelievable. That, I mean, that, two years ago, that would have sounded like the most outrageous thing in the world. Completely unbelievable.

completely impossible, out of left field. She did it, just to announce a fight booking. And then, of course, when you consider the fact that Misha Tate didn't know, that Holly might not deserve it, that she only fought twice in the UFC, they haven't been the most impressive performances of all time, there's certainly a lot to gripe about, but first, let's recognize the fact of what just happened, and it's part of this Ronda Rousey movement that's bigger than anything we've ever seen. You know, MMA fans are so interesting because, you know, one second, I can't even

I was telling New York Rick something, but I just realized that we don't have internet. Can he speak to me? Okay, the internet is still down. I just wanted to tell New York Rick if he can alert Michael Bisping that, via his cell phone, that we're having this issue, so he's not just sitting around. Can do. Thank you. Yeah, he just said he can. So hopefully we're trying to fix this situation.

Unfortunate kills me. A piece of my soul dies. but I'm trying to ignore that. It took me almost a week to get over last week's show, the technical problems, and, well, this almost seems like it's worse. Anyway, MMA fans are very interesting when it comes to Ronda Rousey because they sort of act like the fan base of a band that, you know, they were there from day one,

and they get a little weird about her, you know, hitting the mainstream. They feel weird when ESPN talks about her versus Floyd Mayweather. They feel weird when she's, you know, on these red carpet. selling these movies, all that stuff. But let's not forget the fact that MMA fans were very slow to accept Ronda Rousey. I mean, MMA fans were belly aching, you know, from here all the way to, you know, Washington State, complaining that she didn't deserve the title shot, that she was getting pushed, that she was getting pushed because of her looks, all this stuff.

I mean, they weren't really on the bandwagon from day one, like the fans in Seattle were for Nirvana back in the day. But look, I was as surprised as anyone definitely surprised. and unfortunately that Misha Tate had to find out that way. You know, I think she definitely deserved, I know she definitely deserved a call beforehand, a tech, something. But that's the fight business, and I understand why they're doing it. I would love to see Holly Holm get a couple more fights.

I think for her MMA game, it would behoove her to get a couple more fights before fighting the greatest of all time right now in Ronda Rosti. She's the best female fight in the world, no doubt about it in my mind. A couple more fights would be tremendous. for her, but that's not the case. That's not the game that they're in with Rhonda right now. They need fresh faces, fresh storylines, fresh opponents. And when you have a background, somewhat like Sarah McBan. She had the Olympic thing. Holly has the boxing thing. These are fights that you can sell. These are fights that people can get behind.

Just reading resumes, not watching their previous fights. It sucks for Amanda Nunes, and I don't know if I necessarily agree with the idea of booking Amanda Nunes versus Misha Tate. I really don't. but that might be what Amanda Nunes has to do and Meechitaid has to do, just given the landscape. Look who else is out there. The Ronda Rousey show. Okay.

You know what I think we should do as we wait here? Mr. New York, Rick? I'm here. Do you have questions so that we don't waste time. People in the replay can get the questions, and hopefully this will be up sooner rather than later. So right now we can't connect with anyone, right? we cannot so bizarre what do they say happen the internet and the entire building is down or at least

in our studio hmm and you reached out to michael and dan i have what about the other two i'm hoping that we i don't have to but i will will probably be i mean it's already 10 uh okay let's answer some questions and then uh we'll get to we'll get to pray a little bit in the meantime and see if this all gets figured out okay first question you're not going to be able to see them, so... Oh, because of the connection problem. That's fine. I don't need to see it.

I'm going to read them out. Yeah. Next for Max Holloway, a few people, including Brian Stan after the fight, suggested that there should be a rematch following Olivera's injury. Do you agree, or do you think Mack should now face a higher ranked opponent? If not a rematch, then do you think Edgar should be the fight that he takes next? You know, this is what we were talking about with a chat. And by the way, we're not speaking for nothing here.

This is being recorded, right? It is. This will all be on the replay? It will be. Okay. Because then I just, you know, rant it for. 10 minutes to myself. Was that?

Alex? He's saying that it's not going out on YouTube right now. Of course. So we'll have to do the replace. After the fact. Yep. But iTunes, all that stuff. iTunes.

It will be everywhere. Yes. Okay. It's a very tough one. I don't know if there's a right answer. I like the idea of Chad Mendes versus Edgar. I think that's a fight we've been talking about,

thinking about for a long time. And I actually think it makes sense from a featherweight landscape perspective, but I also like the idea of Frankie Edgar versus Holloway, because I think that's a perfect number one contender fight. I don't know if you go with Mendez right away if he beats a Frankie Edgar. I think if Holloway beat Frankie Edgar, he deserves it. And I think if Edgar beats Holloway, he deserves it. I mean, he deserves it right now.

So I kind of feel like those are the two options, and I wouldn't be mad at either. I would love to see Edgar and Holloway. I really have been impressed by Max Holloway lately. I think that he's ready for this next step. I mean, it just seems like his confidence, his body language, the way he's speaking, everything about it makes me think that he's ready for it. And I think that that would be a fantastic fight. So you go with Holloway over Edgar?

Holloway versus Edgar. Yeah, that's what I mean. I mean Holloway Edgar over Mendez versus Edgar. Yeah, I like that fight. So what do you do with Mendez? That's a tough one. That's a really tough one. Did you Jeremy Stevens?

I'm okay with that as well. And I saw Frankie Edgar on Twitter said that he's okay with Jeremy Stevens as well. So, I mean, you could really do a combination of those four in really any configuration. And other than I don't think you want to do Stevens and Holloway. I think you want to put each of those guys against either Edgar or Mendez. Just because I feel like Stevens Holloway are two fresher contenders and you don't want to knock them off or one of them off by putting them against each other. So you put them up against Edgar and Mendez as kind of. of the proof that they're ready to take the next step.

I definitely feel like they should put whatever variation of those fights in December at the same time as the title fight because the timing works out. They're all ready to go. They all want to fight. And I just feel like that will, you know, all eyes are on McGregor-Aldo, but now all eyes will be on the division. And you want to boost up the division, especially that division, which hasn't had times like this before.

Put them in December. You have tough finale. you have the 194 card or even the Fox card in Orlando. Yep. Our next question. Oliver Holloway. Holloway receives a win, but one can't really say he beat Olivera. Yes, he was definitely winning.

And under Unified Rule 16A, if an injury sustained during competition as a result of the legal maneuver is severe enough to terminate about, the injured contestant loses by technical knockout. That seems to cover the situation. But the legal maneuver, which left Oliver injured, was as much as only a little bit. doing, if not more so, than anything Max did. Should have moved by a fighter, which results in his or her injury, really lose by TKO after 90 seconds? Obvious differences, but what if a fighter just tore an ACL by tripping 90 seconds to the fight with no contact or attempt as such by an opponent? Should that also be considered a TKO? Look, my colleague, Mark Romandie spoke to Sean Loughlin,

and we've had him on this show before the individual who injured his ankle right before his debut in Omaha, Nebraska, just a couple years ago. It was in 2012, I believe. That is not a loss because he never actually stepped foot in the cage. But I believe if you step foot in the cage, they say, let's get it on, whatever they say. And then for whatever weird reason, you can't continue, I kind of feel like it's a loss. If it's one second in, 10 seconds in, eight minutes in, how else do you do it? I mean, it's not Holloway's fault. He needs to progress. He needs to move on with his career. I mean, I suppose a no contest could be, you know, could be argued, but I don't really have a problem with that result. Yeah, I think, you know, it's too much of a subjective thing. If we start going by, oh, well, let's say, I kick you in the leg and then, you know, five minutes later, I don't touch you, but you, you know, fall down. You could say, oh, he planted his knee wrong and it wasn't, it wasn't anything I did, or that could have been an accumulation of damage. And you're getting into hazy territory, I think, if you step in the cage and if you're

injured or, you know, knocked out, you lose by TKO. I think that's the only fair way to do it. Although, you know, it obviously is heartbreaking for a guy like Olivera in this case, because it seems like, you know, that wasn't really anything. That fight could have clearly continued if he hadn't been hurt. It wasn't like he was put in a bad situation. He was actually getting up from Max Holloway being on. top of him. So I think that's the only way you can do it, even though, you know, sometimes in

cases like this, it seems like it wasn't much of anything Holloway did more so an injury. Yeah, I mean, Holloway actually started the fight looking pretty good and he's continued to look very good. I mean, what a progression, super young guy. This is why you can't. He's one of my new favorites. He's the new BJ Penn. Get out of here. I mean, just because of the accent. Well, the Hawaiian, there's something about that warrior spirit. There's something about that accent. I I could listen to that accent all day long. I know you like the slang as well. Why not, yes.

There's something about it. He also has this baby face. He's great. He's come a long way. And it's a great story because he's one of those guys. You're not quite sure what to make of him when he starts. But then you look at his age. Man, I mean, the guy's, what, 23 years old?

Yeah. You're not even in your prime yet at 23. It's not even close. He's got many years. Look at Carl's Condit. Carl's Condit's 31. Look at what he's done. And then you think of a guy like Max Hallway

and the amount of fights he's had thus far at just 23 is pretty amazing. So I think he's the youngest. I believe that I think Michael Carroll might have tweeted this out, that he's the youngest to 10 wins in the UFC. Wow. Which is impressive for all the names that have come through the UFC. Of course. At 23, I think he's the youngest to 10 wins.

It was very bizarre or it was very disturbing watching what happened to Olivera because it was sort of a delayed reaction. And then you find out that it's, a micro tear in his esophagus, which sounds horrendous and very painful. You just see that, and I didn't like it. What a bad way to end what had been a pretty enjoyable card up until that point. I have, by the way, I have this routine now when I'm home for some of these cards. This always happens. I'll make it up until the co-made event. I'll fall asleep after fighting it, and then I'll wake up to the post-fight show. Doesn't matter who's on it. I just wake up to their

voice and be like, what the hell has just happened? Did the fight end? And then I have to rewind it and rewatch it. It happens to me every damn time. It's very frustrating. It's the kids. It's the kids. This one was an hour earlier, but still tough.

Speaking of this card, we're staying on this card. There's quite a few questions. For me, this is from our friend James Glory. For me, Neil Magnis was the performance of the night, knowing that Silva would have clearly studied Maya's defeat and built his game plan around it. Magnet showed that he learned and developed from the law. and in getting back on the golden path of victory, I'll class Silva in a very promising performance.

So the question is, excuse me one second, I'm about to sneeze. Bless you. Thank you. That's good radio right there. Right into the mic. I could have killed my mic. I mean, wow. You ever hear of a cough button over there?

There's so much going on right now. What is going on? For God's sake, I'm about to shoot myself. Go ahead. Just how much does this victory tell you about Neil Magnin's future in the division and after yet again having the false narrative about his uh his being the next big thing being exposed what does this tell you about the disappointing disappointing and sadly sporadic eric silva okay there's a lot to untangle there i will say i don't know if it was the performance

of the night certainly a very impressive performance because when you come back after suffering the first defeat in what was seven fights i think it was against damiaia completely get out class go all the way to brazil i mean you can understand if the guy's going to take a load off and say you know what? I'm going to take a little break here, regroup, figure out what went wrong, and then see when I want to come back. This guy comes back on three weeks notice. And really, I mean, I think he said it on the post-fight show. He had a four-day training camp. I mean, the fight was three weeks later, but the actual time in which he had to prepare for the fight way less than three weeks. He said he had a four-day training camp, which is insane. He comes out and he performs

like that, forget about the physical roadblocks coming back from, you know, a fight that you had just three weeks ago, the mental ones as well. I mean, that, to me, might be the toughest part. This is an athlete. He's done this before. You know, if you come from athletics, you can compete three weeks later. But it's the mental side. It's getting over the fact that you just lost. You are, you know, very close now to getting into that title talk and regrouping, not doubting yourself, still being confident. You know, he said that. that the Maya loss was actually a good thing, which you hear before. I mean, we've heard that time and again. But A, it gets the monkey off your back, and B, it might humble you a little bit.

You might think that your crap don't stink if you start beating all these guys, especially coming from these fights where you're, you know, you're down, you're getting rocked, and then you're coming back. I mean, you're on fire at that point. And the Maya fight was almost his heat check. It's like, if you play basketball and you've hit like six threes, and now you take a, you know, you take a three from the half court line. That's a heat check. The Maya fight was a big jump for him. That was his heat check. It didn't work out. No sweat. Come back. Be the guy like Eric Silva. You're back on your winning ways. Eric Silva, I don't know what to make of this guy. I mean, it was said online. It's worth saying here. His body looked completely different. Was that a product of the new testing?

Who knows? I mean, they're not doing a lot right now. That's been well documented. But his body look different. Is that a product of him not taking this fight camp seriously? Was the intro? I don't know what it was, but once again, a guy who I felt had a ton of potential and for whatever reason, wins one, loses one, wins one, is not able to realize it. That was my takeaway from the fight. But there were a lot of great performances. Like I said, Littuono was great. Patrick Cote had a very fun performance. Frankie Perez, who we've talked about a little bit on the show, had a great performance. So I don't know if it was the performance, but what impressed me the most, once again was him being able to come back from that mental setback against Damian Maya

and rebounding the way he did. You live back there? What's that? Are you alive back there? Yeah, I'm just trying to connect with our other guests as well. Oh, did you speak to them? If you want me to keep talking, I'll keep talking. Yeah, if you could.

No problem. Yeah, the other guests, like I said, we still have, I mean, I still want to talk to Michael Bisping if we can get them. I don't know how long where I'm actually going to sit here, but we can get to the questions and inside the vault and all that stuff, and hopefully that will buy us enough time. Then Dan Hardy, and then we want to talk to Ephraini Escadero and Mike Winklejohn.

Lots to talk to Coach Wink about. Condit, Dotson, Soroni. But the main one is Holly Holme. That's his prized pupil. That's someone that he has been with for quite some time. That is someone that he has been grooming for this moment. Also worth noting Patrick Cote calling out Hector Lombard. I don't know if from a ranking standpoint, it makes a lot of sense. I know Rory

mentioned he was interested in fighting Lombard in January when he's cleared after the suspension. I think that might make more sense. And if you look at the rankings, it really, I mean, there aren't a lot of guys out there for Rory right now. So I wouldn't hate that. But I love when guys call people out. I mean, that's well documented. We've talked about that a thousand times on this show. And I give him ball. You know, look, the guy had balls to, I don't give him balls. I give him props for having the balls to call out a guy who's, who's tough, who's, you know, who's looked great at 170, who's higher ranked. Even if you don't think that you're going to get the fight, just call someone out. Just say something. Holloway, I want to fight Frankie Edgar in

Hawaii. Perfect. Give us something to talk about. Give the people. Give the people. something to get excited about. That's a big part of this sport. Who's next? What's next? Where's the fight? What's at stake? It never works if you just say, I'll leave it up to the UFC.

History has shown that it never works. So I liked it. That was great. He was loving himself, feeling good. Patrick Cote is a guy who was left for dead. Released from the UFC, who thought he would enjoy this kind of resurgence? at 170 as well. I think he's now 4-1 or 5-1 since dropping down to 170. That's great.

Speaking of Canadians, happy trails to Canadian veteran Joe Dirksen. Almost like 70 fights that we know of on his resume, his pro record. He announces retirement. El Dirtay. Manitoba's own announces retirement last week. Man who, of course, fought in the UFC, been around the block, done his thing. and says he's done. And I like it. I like when a fighter can say that. Go out on his own terms. I don't know if we're going to see a lot of guys in this day and age

get to that many fights. Kind of a throwback, if you will, but wanted to mention him as we're talking about all these great Canadians who competed last night in Saskatoon. All right, we got any more questions? Or is he still talking on the phone? All right, sounds like he's still talking on the phone. Let me mention that the UFC officially now,

a card that we had reported on earlier in the week, the South Korea card that is November 28th in Seoul, South Korea. Every time I think of Seoul, I think of Ben Johnson, who, of course, is responsible for one of the great moments in Canadian Olympic history, and then one of the lowest moments ever won the 100 meters, and then was stripped because he tested positive for steroids. I always think of him when I think of soul. Anyway, the main event is going to be Benson Henderson versus Tiago Alves at 170 pounds. I love the fact that when I reported this, all these people kept asking me what weight, even though it's in the article. Like, it's so hard to actually click on the damn link. And then they're like, but what about Teago Alves saying

he's going down to 155? Didn't you report that? And I explained it in the article. I mean, I just love this. So yes, it's at 170. Yes, Tiago Alvas's manager, Malkikawa told me that, that they were dropping down to 155, but this is a big fight. They liked it. They're putting that on ice. It's still in the cards. It's still something that they're shooting for. But a main event fight against Benson Henderson coming off a loss against Carlos Condit is something that they're down with. And Benson was open to 170 or 155. He's coming off a great win and sparring win. One of the great moments of 2015 against Brandon Thatch and his welterweight debut. They were open to big fights at 155 or 170. And they got this opportunity. And they got this opportunity. And they

said, yeah, let's go for it. They're just pretty much interested in big moments at this point. Big fights, big opportunities, big stages. He wanted to fight in South Korea. His mom is from South Korea. He wanted to main event that show. They've given him that. He suffered an injury not that long ago.

He was on this show talking about it. Didn't want to really divulge what was going on there. And that's fine. I can respect that. Talked about it as much as he could. He gets his wish and Tiago Alvas gets a big fight regardless of weight class. surprised when I heard that Tiago Alva's wanted to move down to 155. I mean, this is a guy who we all thought had trouble making 170 back in the day. Not so much these days, but remember

the Matt Hughes fight and that run a few years back? I always thought that he'd be, you know, more inclined to go up to 185, not 155. For now he's sticking around in 170. They also announced Mirko Krokop versus Anthony Hamilton. I like Krokoop fighting in Asia again. I think that makes sense. I like the Mitrione idea better. I think that's a juicier fight. It makes more sense for both guys. I know Maturon's coming off a loss and Crocoq coming off a win, but that rule doesn't really apply these days. Good to see Krokoop back. I like the Mitrione idea better, though. I really like Jorge Mazvedal versus Dung-Yang Kim. They also announced that. I think that's a lot of fun. And, you know, Mazvedal, speaking of guys with balls, he wanted to fight Matt Brown. And then he said,

all right, I'm not getting that. Give me Kim in South Korea. He asked for this. Coming off his first welter rate win as well. So that's the Korea card that they announced officially last night,

but Piranha NMA fighting, which we can't be right now because of our internet problems. You knew about that already. More questions? Not yet. Anyone.

Bueller? Bueller. I am here. What's going on? So internet is still down. We tried to do a little funky, different way to get the guests on. Yeah. There was feedback.

It wasn't going to work. But we're still trying other ways. Don't give up. I'm not giving up. And so it's the internet and the phone. Well, the phone is connected to the internet. It is? So it's down, yeah.

It's the same service or is it one of those internet phones? Yeah, it's an internet phone. It's V-O-I-P. So it's not hard-lined it. We don't have real. a real hard line? Well, we do, but it wouldn't be able to connect to the show. The show?

The trycaster. Okay. Let's pause the questions. Let's go inside the vault. April 2008 is the date. I spoke about this with Roger Huerta. My very first on-camera interview, over seven years ago, in his hotel room, dating the Octagon Girl Ariani Celeste at the time. And a funny thing about this.

my good friend John Raffman, we were there to actually record an interview in which Ariani Celeste was going to interview Roger Huerta, kind of a play on their relationship and all this stuff, and Ariani was doing some stuff for MMArated.com, the late great, mommarated.com. And when I walked in, I was nervous. I mean, wow, this is a chance to be with a fighter and there's room. I mean, woo-hoo. Right before UFC 83 is a big deal for me. And we were just kind of shooting the breeze. And my man, John Rathman, who was kind of preparing for the interview as well, the one with Ariani and Roger just started recording us. And the conversation was pretty good, but you'll see it's not your typical Halwani interview. Anyway, conversation was fine,

and we thought, all right, can we use this? We asked Roger, he was cool with it. And it ended up being my first ever on-camera interview for M.A. rated, which was my real first job in MMA media. that was Jerry Park, but that was me trying to do my own thing. This was my debut, so to speak. So it's April 2008. In my hometown of Montreal, of all places, here's my interview with Roger Huerta that we spoke about last week on the show. Hi, you're looking at you. Nice to meet you, man. Nice to meet you. Thanks to meet you. Thanks for doing this. I just wanted to relax, really. Yeah. For once, just like... Five fights, man.

In one year, it's insane. I know. Yeah. What people don't understand is that when you fight someone is making their debut in the UFC is that those guys have nothing to lose but a lot like and they want to prove what they're made of right you know what I mean like they're going to come out and show them that I belong in the UFC right right and so those are the most dangerous ones right you know and and I face a lot of few of those yeah like the Guida fight that was like sort of the cherry on top I guess for you because the rest of the guys were sort of you know like the crane I love the fact that Guida had just fought Marcus Aurelio I don't think that should have been a split decision I think that was

unanimous and just beat the living target to him and and you know obviously Marcus was ranked like third in the world or something like that and he had been go-mey at one point and had lost I guess by decision so you know what I mean like that guy was up there yeah and then Clay just you know did what he did with the guy then and also you know when Clay had fought Griffin I mean that was I think in all honestly and I'm going to nothing against Tyson I you know I like the guy he's a great guy but watching the fight I mean you know what at a fan standpoint and even at somebody that I'm a big fan of the sport right I'm a huge fan of the sport yeah I'm like happy there's no way that Claywood should have lost that fight you I

won that Rob so it was a good fight it's good that you finished it too yeah because a lot of his fights have gone to decision yeah all the fight exactly all the fights have gone to decision this one was like there's you know it's a done deal I'd be the guy you We used to talk. Oh, really? Yeah, I think we, one of the first nights I went out in Vegas, I went out with him. Really? In his car, he picked us up.

Me and Justin took us to Trist, I think. And, yeah, we're all having a good old time. And then now he's calling me out. So it's kind of, huh? But is there beef there? No, I've never had any beef with a guy. Never, never. I've always.

Is he a beef with you that you are fighting up? I really don't think so. I don't, well, you know what? I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know. I don't know anything about him. I don't know what caused him to say I want to fight Roger instead of the title.

Yeah, it's true. The time that he impressed me, like, the most. Alvin Robinson? Yes. Yeah. That was it. When he was like back against the wall, they needed to rush it, and he's just like, I finish fights. I mean, he just, like, stampede through that dude, and that's when I was like, holy shit.

Yeah. You know? Robinson was, I think it was his first fight in UFC, so he had, like, jitter. or whatever. But then Robinson fought George Griselle and beat the Charham. But then he fought

Diaz and Diaz did that. It's weird. Your whole division is messed. That was like, I'm like, whoa, son. That's interesting. Diaz isn't, I'd love to hear your take on Diaz too

because he's Nate because he's like calling out everyone. I'm surprised he hasn't called you out and he's doing well. I think his brother called me out. Really? That's not going to happen. Actually, his brother did call me out.

I wasn't playing. I'm planning on fighting in August, really. Oh, really? I wasn't, I kind of didn't want to fight in August. And I was more planning on fighting like in November. I think I told you that. And then that was kind of like the, okay, let's do it. You know, let's just do it.

And I think that, yeah, who wins that fight, which I will. What's it called? We'll be the normal contender. We're good friends. How we met was through PR. was through PR tours for the UFC. When I was doing, when, before my debut, I had fought. And then after my debut, I started doing, like, media tours for the UFC,

but for the Hispanic, the Hispanic media type stuff. Like, we were trying to get the Hispanic market. And so they ended up getting her because she's a Latina. And then they got Diego Sanchez as well. Right. And so us three, we had gone, our first tour was in Miami. Right. Yeah.

Miami and Houston. Miami and then we did Houston. Yeah. Okay. So that's where we kind of, us three were like, you know, buddies and shit. Okay.

And then stuff. Stuff. Oh, right. Yeah, no, it was internet. Go crazy. Oh, okay. No, no. No, um, what's it called?

So, yeah, that's where we all, like, met and we became friends. There it is. How about that? Two lovebirds. Doing their thing. In the hotel room. sacred ground, if you will.

So that's the interview that I referenced last week with Roger Huerta. Just got an update from one of the guys here. Apparently there is an outage of sorts, the entire building, but only an internet outage. That's why I got lights and stuff here. So we will keep trucking along, answering questions. Hopefully that will buy us enough time, and hopefully our guests are still available.

You know, look, I like being as honest as possible with the audience. It is really disheartening when this happens because this show, above everything, is on my mind, you know, from the end of the show, 430 Eastern until, you know, the following Monday. I'm trying to think of the best guests, reaching out to those guests, booking those guests, making sure, I mean, they can tell you I'm a pain in the ass when booking these guys. and they take 20 minutes out of their day to come on the show, and now you tell them, oh, I'm sorry, you know, it's just, it's a real bummer. So that's the part that bothers me the most. I know this is being recorded, and you can watch it after the fact,

but it's just, you know, telling someone to devote 20 minutes to you and then not coming through is very disappointing. Or devoting that 20 minutes, and then there being a technical issue is very disappointing. But for now, hopefully we can just flip-flop the show, get through the questions, and then hopefully those people will be available on the back-in and we can talk to them. So let's get back to the questions. Okay, first question up.

Frankie Perez retiring after a win. What are your thoughts on 26-year-old Frank? I'm sorry, Perez retiring after his impressive K.O. win against Stout. Do you believe that fighters retiring at an early age to avoid potential brain trauma could become a trend in MMA similar to how it was in the NFL? Well, let's be clear. He didn't say that's the reason why he retired. He did say, you know, I don't want to put my body through this, my family through this.

he alluded to that, but he never actually, you know, went out and said, this is the reason why I'm retiring. I thought it was great. I mean, here's a guy, look, everyone has different reasons why they fight. Some fight for money. Some have four kids, and, you know, they need to support these individuals and their wife and their mom and their dad and their brother or sister. Some fight just because they need more money in their bank account. Some fight because they actually love, you know, going in there and competing, and this is the sport that they're back. that everyone has a different reason why he or she fights. And I don't think it's up to us. I mean, I'm cool with people weighing in on it like Bisping did, but look, he made it. His goal was to make it.

He made it. He won. He knocked out a legend. And, you know, a guy who's highly regarded, a pioneer, if you will, in his home country, he thinks to himself, all right. That's a perfect way. I think that should be celebrated. More often than not in this sport, we talk about shows like this, people who stick around too long. You know, people who fight well past their prime, well past, you know, the spotlight. Now here's a guy at 26 picked up his 10th pro victory, his first inside the Akron in his second UFC fight, and said, Mama, I'm coming home, I'm done, I'm good. I can't top that. Perfect. I thought what he said was great. It was coherent. It made sense. That kind of thing should be celebrated. What do you think of it?

I think I feel I'm of two minds about it. I mean, I think it's great that somebody's able to, you know, do an actual analysis of, of their life and their career and say, you know, I've reached the pinnacle and or, you know, not the pinnacle, but I've accomplished a goal I wanted to accomplish and now I feel comfortable walking away from it. But at the same time, I just feel like the things that, the points that BISP being raised were not completely invalid in the sense that, well, you know, the goal to be a champion and all these things that you get into the sport for are still attainable. And, you know, if you were in the sport in the first place, then there had to be a point where you were aiming

for those. I guess, you know, goals can adjust and things like that. But it seems like, it almost seems like we're losing somebody prematurely rather than, you know, when they accomplished everything they've wanted to accomplish. Yeah, I get that. Like I said earlier, by the way, can we not switch camera angles? Is that why we're always on this one and not going to you and stuff? We can switch, but we can't go to me. Why not?

Your hair not ready? What about, like, what about this camera angle? I need to switch it on the network. I can switch your camera angles. Yeah, we can switch to you. How come we're not doing that? Freshen it up. There it is.

But we can't see your wonder. face. I wish. So I get what you're saying. Yep. Mark Henry told me, like I said, in Connecticut, this is the guy. This is the future. Frankie Perez. Watch out for him. And even hearing Frankie say, like I saw his interview backstage, he's like, I've never felt better with my hands. I never been more confident. I was like, oh, wow, I can't wait for your next one. Oh, wait, there is no next one. So it's a very bizarre thing. I get it. I get the way you feel. But to me, for a 26-year-old guy to have, you know, the plan figured out, and he spoke to Chuck Minhaal. He said that he figured it out the day before the Wands and called up his whole family,

except for his dad, didn't want to talk to his dad about it, called up, you know, his siblings, his mom, and told him this is going down, right? I mean, that's putting on a hell of a lot more pressure on your shoulders, but also it's like, wow, you have the presence of mind to figure out, look, I don't want to do this. I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to put my body through this, my family through this. I think it's very commendable. Look, there's a lot of reasons not to do it.

this. Sometimes I don't understand why people do this. You know, there's not a lot of money at the bottom. There's not a lot of sponsors at the bottom. There's not a lot of opportunities at the bottom. There's a lot going on at the top, but it takes a long time and a lot of pain and suffering and time and effort to get to the top. You won that fight in the UFC? Awesome. You knocked out a guy. Awesome. Do your thing. I see the Wi-Fi thing popping up here. Is this a sign of things to come? Yes, I think we may be getting back online now. Okay. Well, we'll keep going. Let me read you a question and step away so I can see what we can do. Okie-doch.

Nikita Krilov, is Al-Kipone a top 15 lightweight, I'm sorry, light heavyweight now, three-fight win streak, all first round stoppages, and four-and-one since moving down to 205 pounds. Who should he fight next? This person suggests Little Nog, Faizhao, Alir Latifie. Hmm. I like the Latifi one, and I believe it's pronounced Krylov. I like the Latifi one. He's a fun fighter. He's got a great background. Sean Al-Shadi wrote a great story about him and what he's been through in the Ukraine. A man of very, very, very few words. There's no doubt about that. He's an interesting cat, no doubt. And his fights are interesting as well because they're not exactly the most technical. They're not exactly, you know, textbook. And yeah, he did hold onto the cage. You know, you can't overlook that. He did grab the fence. But he survived. pretty tight submission, came back, and he's always winning in the first round. When he wins,

it seems to be always in the first round. Super Young Fighter, great sure-dog profile pick, Al Capone. I like Nikita Crylov. I always enjoy watching him fight. How far is the flight from the Ukraine to Saskatchewan? What a journey that must be. So yeah, I like the Latifi fight a lot. I'd like to see Latifie get a, I mean, I don't know if this is the big name fight that people were we're searching for, but I like that fight. I think that makes sense. So I think my internet is working here. It's potentially exciting. Let me see if the stream is working. I don't want to get too excited at the moment. You know what happens when we get too excited. Oh, see something? No. It says video was interrupted. But I could still, you know, surf the web. I trust they'll tell me

when they are ready to rock and roll. Some of it's working. Some of it's not. All right, any other questions? Can you jump back on? Are you busy? Apparently you're busy. How dare you, Mark? How dare you? Let me see if I can get...

Oh, I can get some questions myself. Let's see what the people are saying. Message to Ariel, Rick, and the team. Not to worry, these things happen. Hope you get it fixed for next time. Best wishes and respect. The always positive James Glory. I love that guy.

Yes. Oh, you're back. Johnson v. Dodson 2. Yes. Is Johnson v. Dodson 2? the most underrated title fight ever. It seems like nobody is talking about this fight when DJ is in a league of his own

in that division, fighting the man who came closest to knocking him out on the feet, flash knocking him down twice in their first fight. What's the question? Is it the most underrated title fight ever and then he's going on to say how dangerous Dodson is in the fight?

Underrated? I don't know if it's the most underrated. I mean, I think it's more of a product of the way people view John Dotson and Demetius Johnson and also the way people view the division. I'm trying to think of a more underrated one. I mean, I could think, maybe.

I feel like there's one that I'm missing. I'm looking forward to it. I think this title fight would have been better served. Look, this card, UFC191 is like, is like the card that didn't need to happen, and it's fine. They've cobbled together a pretty good card in a very short amount of time. This fight, Arlowski-Mir,

but again, Arlowski-Mir, did that need to happen? You know, did Rumble Johnson Manoa need to happen right now? I guess. And who knows what's going to happen with Rumble Johnson and his issues. They're looking into it, his rant on Facebook and then a little bit on social media, which he's deleted since, but still worth looking into, no doubt. John Dodson versus Demetrius Johnson felt like the perfect fight for like the Australia card, right? I mean, you put a second title fight on that card. It's in a big stadium. It's a big stage. A lot of people talking about it. I don't know, there's something about these Labor Day cards. Something always seems to be off. Last year with the whole Joe Soto, Hennon-Berow's situation, a couple years back, UFC 152, no, excuse me, 151. That was a curse card.

Well, 176 wasn't Labor Day, but it was early August, so that one doesn't really count. I feel like there's another one that I always think about. There's something about these. It just feels like 191 was one of those cards that they had on the calendar. did they tried to get Wyden on it, they tried to get a bunch of fights on it, didn't work out. So once again, they put Johnson in the main event. I don't think they wanted to put Mighty Mouse in the main event. I don't think he wanted to be the main event. But his biggest curse,

the worst thing he has going for him is the fact that he's just so damn reliable. He's the most reliable champion in the UFC. By far. He's just always available. And as a result, he's always going through everyone. He's like, who's next? Who do I got next? Who do I got next. Dotson is his best fight since maybe the last Dotson fight because at least Dotson can sell the fight, talk up the fight, promote the fight, and he started off pretty damn good against him in Chicago when they fought a couple years ago. Now, is he back to 100%? Is he ready? Did he need one more fight? You know, did he not look great against Mokovsky because they're friends that he didn't want to finish him? I mean, who knows? But it's definitely the best fight they could put on, whether

Johnson wants to admit it or not. I don't know if it's underrated. I feel like for a Dmitrius Johnson fight, it's actually pretty highly rated. It seems like the internet's working. Where do we stand now? Can a brother get a... Get an update? We are making progress. All right.

Is New York Rick able to ask me another question? No? All right, I'm going into the wall myself. Is there? I'm going to play true or false here. After unifying the belts, McGregor's first defense is against Edgar. I'll go with True.

Edgar's first defense is against Aldo. What does that mean? Edgar's going to beat McGregor? I don't know if I can answer that at the moment. Holly Holme makes it past the first round. True. Frank Mears somehow gets a title shot in 2016. Hmm.

Um, I could see it. True. Fedor fights for Doom in 2016. I could also see it. True. UFC 200 has two title fights. Definitely true.

McGregor Aldo does 1.2 million buys? I'll say false. Weidman fights Jones, I'll say true. How about that? Okay, what's your question? Within 40 days is UFC 192? Why do I feel like it's almost being forgotten? I put these questions back to back

because the theme of being forgotten or underappreciated. Nobody is talking about Kormier versus Gustafin. Do you think people don't care so much about that fight? Or is this the post effect of UFC 194 and 195 stealing all the attention? Who are these negative Nazis that you are? are um they're you you could almost say that they're positive though because they're trying to get shine for the things that they feel are are not being appreciated yes i guess but i don't feel like

one ninety two is being overlooked do you no i mean i get 40 days to me is a long time in the current uh m mma cycle yeah um so i think it may not necessarily be forgotten but it may not It also may not necessarily be as celebrated and promoted as far out as 194 or 195. Yeah, I guess. But I don't know. I think it's just because, A, they just recently announced those cards. And B, I mean, they're bigger fight cards. I think everyone on those cards that you speak of 191 and 192 would admit that.

I don't know. I feel like when 192 was announced, people were talking about it, Gus and Cormier, maybe the controversy around it all. and also they were talking about Woodley Hendricks. Certainly they were talking about Evans Bader. I don't know. I don't feel that way. There are certain cards that you get excited for months in advance.

And then there are certain cards that, you know, it's two weeks away. I'm like, all right, I'm going to start digging into this one. Not all cards are the same. Not all cards are mega cards. Not all cards feature the two biggest stars in the sport right now. And that's Ronda Rousey and Connor McGregor. So I think it's silly to compare them. How's the phones?

Give me something. I'm thinking they're going to be back up in a few minutes. And by the way, to all the people who are saying they're boycotting the show or they're not, let me tell you something. Please, please, hear me out. Do not come back. And this is not me pulling the Dana White. Don't, just, if some technical difficulty is enough to make you not watch the show for a week or two, please, I don't want you ever watching the show. Ever.

Don't come back. See you later. Go do something else with your time. watch something else, you can kiss my butt. I work too damn hard on the show to listen to that kind of crap when we're trying to figure things out. You think we're doing this on purpose? Do you think this is happening on purpose? No. So get the hell out of here. Continue. I want to say that we do want you back. No, we don't want you back. I'm speaking on behalf of myself and the show when I say that. And I'm giving myself free reign to speak on your behalf.

We do not want you back. Oh, no. Yes. Now continue. UFC Seoul Henderson Alves headlighting the Soul card over Stung Gun Mazvi-Dal They're questioning this I know Bendo's mom is Korean But Kim is a big name in South Korea

If the UFC is putting Poria Duffy above Miochich And Rothwell in Ireland Shouldn't Kim headline the event in Seoul Again, what kind of a nipicky question is this These are the wrong questions To be asking me at this juncture This just sounds like a...

I mean, what? You're telling me you'd rather see Kim Mosvedal five rounds over Benson Henderson and Tiago Alva's five rounds? Come on. By the way, I saw a stat of co-main events. Like, I think it was Michael Carroll who put this out, that there's a case to be made for co-main events being five rounds, too. I think that's a little much.

But something like every co-main event has gone the distance in the last, I don't know. Did you see this stat? Am I kidding? No, no. It's, I think that slot specifically has the highest rate of decisions out of, you know, the rest of the main card slots. I think I wouldn't necessarily mind five round

co-main events. Really? I think we've discussed this before and I was all for it. Five round co-main event. Maybe if it's deemed a 100% no doubt about it, not just Guy Misha Tate, maybe someone will get 100% number one contender fight. Maybe then. Yeah, I mean, do we really

need two five-round fights on the same card? If they're good. I mean, I would have liked to see, what was the co-main event on, uh, on Saturday. It was... You mean on Sunday? On Sunday? On Sunday?

Eric Silva. Yeah, I would have like to see two more rounds, see if somebody could get a finish in that. But the night is long enough as it is. Yeah. I mean, I think it should be subjective. Kind of like the way the UFC has started putting, you know, title fights above other title fights, regardless of weight class. I think that it should be a subjective thing like that.

If this is a no-brainer needs to be five rounds, then make it five rounds. Co-made event. I don't like the idea of never. It can never be five rounds. Sometimes I want five rounds in the co-main event. I want to get behind the idea of getting rid of the co-main event word. How about that? I think that's a more worthy cause than this cause.

Anyway. Okay, let's get something positive. Yes, for God's sake. I mean, are you trying to piss me off here? Are you trying to make it worse? This person from Twitter. Holly versus Rhonda, what are your thoughts? but I think you touched upon that pretty extensively.

Extensively. And then this person is also more excited to see the 115 pound title fight. How about that? That's cool. Hey. Okay, this is a good plug. I don't know if we could show. Can we show the Kyle Haas thing?

No. Oh, damn it. Oh, wait. No, I'm wrong. We can. We can. Okay. Well, my good friend Kyle Haas, who's brilliant, Hollywood Haas, H-A-A-S-E on Twitter. He's the one who made this. who made this.

No phone thing. What happened? What happened? You're on the mic here. I can hear you. Well, now you can't run away. Come back. What'd you say?

I swear to God. I heard you say no phone thing. Oh. Yeah. What did you just say? I said no phone thing. Oh. What does that mean?

Is it gone for the whole show? Well, I mean, the whole show so far. Well, we still have an hour left. It's not up yet. That's all. That's my frustration. Are they working on it? They are.

What if we call via Skype? Just Skype phone? We don't have Skype up. Oh, I thought the Internet's working. I think it's only the Wi-Fi. I don't even know. Let me try some creative solutions. Okay, well, this brilliant man, Kyle Haas,

who made this lovely picture over here. See that? The Brock Lesnar, Paul Heyman. Wait, wait, wait, don't go to the comic yet. Yeah, he went to this. He did this. tremendous. What else did he do? Oh yeah. He made the Ariel Hawani Benson Henderson thing over there. You can kind of see it. He's unbelievable at Hollywood House. He's been working on this comic

for the last three or four months about Ariel Helani, which is my ability to a report or put together fights beforehand, much to the chagrin of the UFC bosses. And he put together this comic strip. You can see it right here, there it is. It's a great comic strip. Let me read it at the same time because I think he did a fantastic job. Even New York Rick makes an appearance. You can see this comic over at Kyle Haashe.

H-A-A-S-E dot Tumblr.com. All right, let's go to the first thing. Look how amazing. Go to the first little box there. Look how amazing the detail is. It's unbelievable. On the set of the MMA hour, the world's most watch MMA program.

I like the E at the end of program. And here's me quoted, and we have Eddie Alvarez on the Skype machine. Eddie, after the cowboy loss, who makes sense for you next? And then Eddie says, Nobody in particular, I just want the best in the division

to stay active. Blom, blah. And then I say, how about Benson? That fight makes a lot of sense. And then he says, yeah, that makes sense. I like that name.

And then fast forward. tech-free show. Until then, I say, peace, I'm out of here. La-di-da-da. All right, let's go to the next one. New York Rick, are we clear? There's New York Rick. All clear.

I put my plaid shirt away, get my, whatever that thing is called, the judge's cape. I feel like there's a name for that. Anyway, I go into a special room. Tadda, ta-da, I am the law. Ariel Halani. Look at that.

And then I love this picture here of Lorenzo, the next one, Lorenzo, Dana White, and Joe Silva with their bout agreements. It's actually the one after that. And then after that, there it is. And then in Vegas, they're like, it's been announced. Benson Anderson, Brazil, it's just great. It love it. Their face is great there.

That is good work. Nice job. Kyle Haas. So it's Kyle Haas, K-Y-L-E-H-A-A-S-E dot Tumblr.com. That's where it lives. and it's just fantastic. He did a great job. Look at the detail on the set.

He's got the conda picture up there. Is that the one? No. I mean, it's unbelievable. Well done. I love that guy. He's great. Okay.

More questions? Or do I have to fish him myself? Hopefully they're about to tell me that the phones are working. We could get back to Michael Bisping. Yes? More questions for you. Okay. I'm realizing now how negative they were.

Is this a reflection on your current state of mind? Well, these were selected much earlier in the show when we were rolling along. Tell me about your experience at NXT this weekend. It was awesome. I could not recommend going to see a live wrestling event more highly. It was a lot of fun. And I didn't even miss comment. A lot of times when I'm at like a, you know, a fight event, like a UFC event or, you know, kickboxing or whatever the case may be, you really start to feel like you're missing the commentary because there's lulls and kind of, you know, silence and downtime.

But the WWE event really flowed nicely in the crowd chants and all that stuff. How did you even end up there? A friend of a friend works for WWE. What? What do they do? They're in a... Is this like a top secret thing? You don't like to talk about these things

Why not? Just tell me his job It's actually a she Okay, even better She works in like talent relations Talent relations Yeah Why she hook us up with some guests Could have had a guest today on the show

No not that end of it The other way like entertainers Like getting involved with the WWA Oh did she get the The Green Arrow guy at SummerSlam? I'm sure they were involved with that That's interesting So they get like celebrities to the events

Yeah. So basically she... Like connecting with the, you know... Yeah. So she got you. She got you to the show. You're the celebrity. Yeah, that was it.

I had a run-in. So for anyone who doesn't know, NXT is like the spinoff, but not so much the spinoff. It's like the AAA of WGB, yet they have some veterans. Yeah, I mean, Kevin Owens was there.

Kevin Owens. He was fighting the next night on SummerSlam. Which I don't like. It's like either you're in or you're out. Oh, he gave it as all, though. No, I know. But from like a character standpoint, it feels like he's living double life.

Okay, fine. So you have that. and then you have, you know, legends like Juschen Liger, and then you have Samoa Joe, who, if you've been following wrestling, I mean, this guy... Now, I looked on Wikipedia, and apparently Juschen Liger is 50 years old. Yeah, who knows if it's the same guy, but... But that's pretty incredible.

If he was 50, then God bless him. He looked great. Well, so's the Undertaker in that range. Yeah, but he was doing a lot more athletic kind of moves than... Absolutely. The one thing I'll say, I did tune in, more so because I was curious about the crowd that they were able to sell out an arena like Barclay Center. I heard that they released two-inched tickets on Saturday and sold them out in 20 seconds.

So I was curious about the Brooklyn crowd and all that stuff. My one gripe was that it felt too rehearsed. It felt too scripted. Like, it's clear that it's the minor leagues to a degree. Some of the characters are figuring it out and all that stuff. But when the minor leagues are presented on a stage like that where it looks like the big leagues, it's hard to remind yourself that this is, for the most part, a group of athletes who aren't quite ready for the big leagues. You get what I'm saying?

Yeah, I mean, I didn't get that feeling from the audience. Now, A, I'm not watching, you know, on TV with the tight camera angles and seeing that, you know, very up close. I'm kind of just seeing the outlines of moves and seeing all that type of stuff from the crowd. And also, I have this, you know, raucous, you know, 15,000. plus person crowd that's around me and it's you get really into it so um i didn't get that sense like i thought it was it was fantastic you know everything looked awesome and on all the matches were a lot of fun um but i could understand that i'm sure if i went back and watched it on uh on the network it was the crowd was fantastic oh it was it was it was something that i would recommend for

anybody i could i could not recommend it more highly even if you didn't know who these people were I don't know. Like, I wouldn't consider much. I feel like you're a closet wrestling fan. Like, you keep dropping these little clues here and there. I mean, you're showing up to NXT events. It takes a special kind of wrestling fan to do that. I love, I love the idea of, like, wrestling as a business.

Like, I listen to all the podcasts because I like the idea of, like, I like when they talk about behind the scenes type stuff. I like when they talk about work versus shoot stuff. But I don't really follow the wrestling. But I like the, the wrestling business is very fascinating to me. yeah and there are a lot of similarities to the fight business sure well to the mMA business in particular

more similarities between wrestling and mma than wrestling and boxing just based on how the the organizations are structured and the promoters and all that stuff i know brock compared dana and vince McMahon last week and that got people all in a tizzy but um yeah no i i i do like that that aspect of it but let's give credit where it's due if you if you don't understand what nxc is that's fine I'm telling you it's a minor league

two degree. It's kind of a quasi minor league. Spinoff promotion. That's not that old. And that was able to sell out a major league arena like the Barclay Center. That's incredible. That's amazing. How about my man Kevin Owens dropping that promo? Did you see that promo where he called the wrestling fans in Florida, the

John Cena of wrestling fans? Did you see that? No. You don't even know what's going on. You can't look at you. You show up to NXT just because it's the cool thing to do in the borough. And you don't even know what's going on. Get out of here. What do you mean?

You don't even know about the promo. I know about the promo. I'm there to watch a great show. I'm not there to watch every promo that they've ever cut in their lives. This is a great. This is maybe the best promo since the CM Punk Las Vegas promo. Oh, God. Wait, that happened in Las Vegas?

You know which I'm talking about? When Sina got thrown against the table and then he sat there and he was like, hey, Cole Cabana, that whole thing? Oh, I thought he did. I thought the pipe bomb was the famous one. There's another one. The most famous one is Las Vegas. It's more famous than the pipe bomb. This is the pipe bomb.

Oh, oh. Yeah, I know about that. I didn't know what happened in Las Vegas. But yeah, I know about that one. I think it was actually the MGM. Either MGM or Mandalay. Anyway, so you went to NXT. You loved it.

How many T-shirts did you buy? None, but... Not one? Nothing? No souvenir. I'm not buying T-shirts. I don't buy, like... Not even like an ironic one.

Something. No, I'm not. there to be ironic. I'm not there to make fun. I'm not there to become a super hardcore fan either. I wanted to see a good show and I saw a great one. Okay. And then to make matters worse,

you went to a... Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. You went to a Major League Gaming sort of event? No, no. Major League Gaming is like an organization, like a league. This one was not MLG. This one was, I think, Riot, the makers of League of Legends hosted this one. I could be wrong about that, but this was the... the North American Championship for League of Legends.

The North American Championship, and what is League of Legends? League of Legends is a computer game that's the most played game ever in history. Across computers, consoles, all that stuff. The most played, downloaded game. Oh, because it's an internet game. It's an online game. And what is the premise of said game? You control a character and you fight on a team.

It's pretty straightforward. Okay, so it's called League of Legends, and people actually watch other people play this game. So they packed MSG to sit... Crazy. The people from MSG to sit in an arena and watch people play on computers. The hell is wrong with this world. Come on, be honest.

Is it interesting at all? I thought I had a great time as well. I went into this weekend thinking, I'm going to hang out with my friends and have a decent time. Did you go with the same people? No, different people. Okay. And I had a way better time than I expected at both of these things.

Which one did you enjoy more? It's hard to say because I really enjoyed them both. It's very different. Like the crowd for WWE is insane. Like the atmosphere there and, you know, the energy of the arena is completely different. Whereas I was more interested in actually what was happening on the screen with the video games because it was more exciting. It's a championship.

it's, you know. You were more into the video game screen? What? Yeah. That is crazy. It's real drama. It's not a performance. So you're able to understand like, oh, something's going.

Like, it's like watching a movie. Well, no. The W.W.E. is more like watching a movie. No, but I mean, in a movie, you're watching a guy going through wherever he is, killing people. That's a movie. It's like, no, it's like watching a sports event. It was more, it was closer. I'd say it was actually closer to a sports event than the WWE was.

What? The, the, the, the, the, the, the, WW was in a ring. It was... No, but this was real competition. How many teams? Two teams. It was the finals.

So what is it... Is it everyone playing at the same time? Or is it like the IFL? There's five guys versus five guys, and they're all playing at the same time. Against each other? Yeah. Or separate games?

Team of five versus team of five, all in one game. And is it like kind of capture the flag where you have to kill the other people? Well, no. Capture the flag. You would have to capture the flag. Sure, sure. This is a...

they're in skirmishes. So every, you know, player controls one, one character and they fight on the screen. I can't believe MSG would stoop to this level. How dare you, sir? What a sad state of affairs over at the me. So how long does this last? This was the championship. What do you mean the championship?

This is the North American championship. And then they go into what, the World Series? They go on to the World Championship, where they're going to get beat by the Koreans or the Chinese. Where were these people from? some of them were from other places like i think you're allowed to have players from from other countries but mostly americans no but like the north american is it like chicago versus boston it's not it's like sponsored teams they have you know coaches they have get out of you they have managers they have coaches they have apparel like they have jerseys and stuff

how do they introduce them did they come down a ramp they know they kind of walked out from behind stage and you know, gave a wave to the crowd. But no, they introduced, like, it was like, up first is some, you know, whatever the guy's name, like Ariel, the nose, Helwani. And then they'd have the guy come out and, you know, there was like pyro and stuff.

It was pretty cool. And people are going nuts. Like, they know who these people are. They know exactly who these specific people are. And what about the jerseys? Are people walking around wearing those? Like, is it, oh, I got a Kevin Durant-esque. Yeah.

Really? Oh, there's, the fandom for this is incredible. Wow. The people knew all. How many people? How many people competing or were there in the arena? In the arena. It's hard to say because they scale it differently for like different things.

But it was, I think it was equivalent to like a concert where like, you know, there was a stage. Over 10K? For sure over 10K. What? At least 15, I have to think. That is wild. They sold out, you know, MSG like a like a performer would. So are you watching it on the big screen?

Yes. And elsewhere? There's other. But, oh, that's back. They're back. I wonder what someone will think if they just tune in now for some strange reason. What has happened to the M.A. Hour? I'm just very fascinated by this.

I saw a real sports story on this, and I find it very bizarre. I feel like it's really, this is the sign of the apocalypse that people are actually into this sort of thing. I don't feel that way. I'm kind of excited about this. And I don't even, I don't even play. Are you going to get into it? No, I don't play these games. It's the same thing with the wrestling.

I had an amazing time, but it didn't. compel me to watch or play it? I would be curious to check it out just to see how bizarre it is. I have an open mind when it comes to these things. I'm not one of these, you know, hoity-to-dy people. I think if you're a wrestling fan, you can kind of see the wrestling and all this stuff.

What do you mean by that? I feel like all of this is sports entertainment. All of this is theatrics. All of this is good guy. Okay, okay. If you're a wrestling fan, you can appreciate this wacky society that we live in and the subcultures that reside in it. I feel like

people who don't get wrestling are a certain kind of person who just can't suspend disbelief. Like, they can't just think outside the box. I mean, I just really feel like people who take themselves so serious. Like, I saw ESPN covering SummerSlam. I thought that was really cool. Great. They were thinking outside the box.

It's a quiet sports weekend. But then I see other people commenting like, what the hell is ESPN doing? I mean, just relax. Stop taking yourself so serious. So I get it. I'm not trying to put these people down. I just feel like watching someone play a video game.

Is there a commentary? Oh, there's commentary, yeah. Oh, wow. This is, this is big stuff. Okay. I know, I know. I saw the real sports story. I was blown away.

I couldn't believe it. One guy was like a mega star. He's taking pictures of people signing autographs. These guys are celebrities. They sold out the staple center. There were lots of people there saying, you know, oh, I'm here for this guy or that guy. They're amazing. They're big celebrities.

And, um... Now, what's, what's the, um, the, the demographic breakdown at these things? Very young. Very young, all males? And I think the play, not all males. No, so, you know, there were a lot of females, a lot of cosplayers and things like that. What was that? Where you dress up, like the characters.

Oh, get the hell out of you. Oh, yeah. There's people walking around like that? Oh, yes. They're walking around as the characters from the game. How's that much different? Like, that's like, when I went to WWE, there were people dressed up as Kevin Owens. Yeah, I know, but are they dressed, like, what are these characters?

Are they, like, furries? Yeah, not furries, but there's, like, characters that are animals and things like that. Oh, my gosh. And when you say young, do you mean, like, sub 18? Possibly. Yeah, I mean, there's definitely high school kids and junior high school kids there. With parents? But there's also, no, I mean, most of them seemed alone.

But there's also like, you know, older people, older than myself. And get out of here. I think I'm old. What's the oldest person you saw? Like someone in their 50s? Someone in their 50s, yeah. Probably there was with this kid. Probably.

But, you know, I think it skews younger for sure, but it reaches all demographics. And how long was this, you said? So it was a best of five that went only three, five. Is there an undercard? No, no. It's just straight into it. Yeah. It was a best of five that lasted only three bouts or three, you know, matches.

So it was like, I'd say game time, it was like an hour and a half. But there was other theatrics. There's promos. There's video packages. Promos? Like they're talking smack? Oh, yeah. They're doing interviews.

And the guys are like, oh, that guy's trash. Like, he's not a good, he's not a good player in this specific way or this guy. And then they're cutting to the commentary team and they're cutting to people who lost earlier in the tournament who are, you know, giving their opinion on the matchup. It's legit. So bizarre. What's the production line? I think there's even like Ariel Hawanis of the, you know, the esports. Yeah, there's definitely guys who will fill that role.

If it's that big, I would imagine there's a media contingency. I wonder if there was a... Dare I say it, I think it's bigger than our small little bubble. You really think so. Yeah, you're right. I mean, if they could sell a... First of all, how crazy is it that they can do that at MSG and not MMA? But I get why.

I mean, one's just a video game. The other one is combat sports. But I wonder. I wonder what industry generates more money. I mean, I guess if you compare the video game industry to the MMA industry, it's not even close. But there's a way to compare maybe just professional gaming. And I would have to think, just, you know, based on what I saw and what I think I know, which is not as much as most, I think that they might have a bigger draw than we do. that is bizarre

so you enjoyed it it was awesome it was never a point where you were like what the hell am I doing here well again like my friends were into it like I think what does that mean when you say they're into it they play it themselves

so they and they know like the strategies and the techniques that are going on so I think a lot of it matters like what kind of crowd you're with and for NXT and for this League of Legends championship it was it was a very good crowd and I had a great time

what a weekend you had it was nice when was that Sunday that was Saturday and the video game thing was on Sunday. Sunday night? Sunday afternoon into evening. You spent a beautiful Sunday afternoon watching people play video games.

How dare you? It's a bizarre thing. But I appreciate the open-mindness. I think that's good to check out these things. Look, I wasn't going in thinking that I was going to start picking up the game and be a convert. I just wanted to have a good time and see a good show. And I feel like on Saturday and Sunday I saw both times I got a really good show. Why didn't you go to SummerSlam?

Why didn't your WWE friend? I didn't want to be greedy. I mean, come on now. Wait, did you pick NXT? No, no, I didn't. I didn't. Okay. That was never on the table.

I'm not, I'm not famous enough. I'm not John Stewart. Wait, did someone reach out to you and say, hey, New York Creek of MMR fame? I have this, or was it a friend who said, hey, no, no, it was a friend. Hmm. While we're shooting the breeze here and trying to figure out the phones, why don't you tell us about your weekend last weekend? You live a very, very, you live an event. Life.

Is that how you describe it eventful? Where were you last weekend? I was in New Orleans for my bachelor party. Now, before we actually get into what happened here, is it not true that you picked New Orleans over Montreal? That is, uh, no, that is not true. My friends who are organizing a bachelor party, you do not choose your own destination. They chose, can if you want. They chose New Orleans over Montreal.

Now, is it not true that you forgot that I had a bachelor party? Well, yes. I mean, how am I supposed to remember? these things. I can hardly even remember what the hell the date is. I mean, trust me, I got more problems on my hands. It was up to you to remind me, as I asked you to remind me, you did not remind me. But anyway, you went

to New Orleans on your bachelor party. Was it a success? I mean, was it something that, oh, wow, the bachelor party? I mean, this is something people dream about. Think about your bachelor party in New Orleans. Hopefully you only have one in your lifetime. I will only have one. I love my wife dearly.

Well, I mean, just saying. She might not feel the same. How dare you? Dude. You know what? I am... Is he gone? Is that it? I just wanted to know if it lived up to your expectations. That's all. Look, I can't do interviews with anyone else. I actually think he didn't do that. Oh, did he do it?

Here we go. Okay. What did you do? Did you unplug it? They're messing around with the board over there. But it felt like you actually did that yourself. I may have. I'm jonesing to interview someone, so I have to resort to interviewing you. That's how pathetic my life has become. I think this might be our highest rate to this.

segment of all time. Can you tell me if it lived up to your expectations? I didn't really have expectations because I didn't, you know, I'm not like a party person. I don't go out like, you know, to clubs or to bars or anything like that. I don't even actually drink. So, you know, I didn't have an expectation that it would be some kind of like debauched event. But it was nice. I had a good time. We went fishing. I caught quite a few fish. I happened to be an expert fisherman. Really? You've done it before? Never done it before. Oh, wow. Okay.

What they say, beginner's luck. That was quite good. I've always wanted to fish. I've never fish before in my life. I've always wanted to go like a very quiet. Yeah. Let's not get crazy. I had enough for you on this one day. You'll be lucky if I ever come back to this damn show. If you ever see me again. But what did you catch? Catfish and redfish.

You love catfish? I love catfish. Is it not true that you used to eat catfish every day for lunch? It's not true, but I used to get fried catfish from a local area, and the smells would... Why no more? I don't know. Is it not good for you? No, catfish is great for you in general.

Yeah, well... But it is fried. Oh, it's fried. So did you eat the catfish? We got to go to, take it to a restaurant and cook up. They cooked up our catfish that we caught fresh, so we got to eat it, which is a really nice experience. What else did you catch? Redfish.

What's that? Tuna? It's a white, it's a white fish. So it's like, you know, a very flaky kind of. The whitefish is the redfish? Well, you know what I mean? Like, it's, it's like a... I really thought it was going to be red.

Not tuna. Like, it's more like a... What's the... What are some crappy fish? Like, you know, it's like the flaky white fish. Cod, yeah, like cod or something like that. Oh, that's a good fish. I like that.

But it's called redfish? That's its actual name? Yeah, because it's red. On the outside. On the inside. but it doesn't have like a real name, like a halibut or something like that? No. It's such a boring name.

So you caught that. Did you wear, did you wear an outfit while you were fishing? I wore a tiara. No. What I want to do is wear like one of those overalls with the high boots in the water. I guess it's called fly fishing, right? Yeah, no, that's fly. That is fly fishing, but we were in a boat.

We were in a boat. Fly fishing, by the way, is that, why is it called fly fishing? Are you using flies as your bait? No, I think because there's something on the line that's called a fly or something like that. I love fly fishing. Wait, you love it? You never done it. No, I've never done it.

But it just seems so peaceful. Yeah, there's an artificial fly on the line that's used to catch fish. But it's not in the sense that it's not like a fly that buzzes around. I want to go to North Carolina, you know, tobacco road, something like that. I guess you can't do a lot of fishing. I have to tell you, this fishing talk on the MMA hour is. Yeah. Well, look, I'm just trying to entertain myself at this point.

No one else. I do see 100 people still on the stream, and I appreciate those people very much, 133 to be exact. They're just waiting, hoping, praying that something is salvaged. And here I am. I mean, we're broadening our horizons here. Anyways, so we get the new viewers. What else did you do? Yeah, this is definitely how we get the new viewers.

I had a few drinks for the first time in quite a long time. I haven't had alcohol since we did that UFC fit thing. all the way back then. Get out of here. No, I stopped drinking completely after that. Not once. Like maybe a beer like one time, but I pretty much cut alcohol completely out.

Okay. So that, I mean, you know, obviously I didn't stay as skinny as I was back then, which was too skinny in my opinion, but I was healthy as a damn horse. But I did completely cut alcohol out of my diet, which is one great thing that came out of that. So, yeah, I had a few drinks on Bourbon Street

as one would do when they're in New Orleans. Yes. And then... How long were you there for? I was there for the weekend only. It sounds like a great time. I still feel like you'd have had a better time in Montreal. I'm sure I would have.

How many people? Four people. Me and my three groomsmen. That's it. Yeah. Did you share a room? No, we had two rooms. Hmm.

How was your bachelor party? It was great. It was like eight years ago, though. So no one cares about that. It was a different man, different time, different place. All right, let's get back to the questions. Let's hit it. Okay.

And now what are these 100 people watching, I wonder? A blank screen. Okay. Kabib Nurmaga Madoff versus Tony Ferguson, the tough 22 finale on December 11th. How is that for a fantastic matchup? This is a game from James Glory. I'm always so positive.

I believe Ferguson will be champion one day, but I and many others still believe the same for the returning Habib. Just how important is the fight to each fighter and the future of the 155 pound division. I want to clear up something about this fight before I answer the question. I noted on Twitter that Habib didn't want a main event fight. He didn't want a five-round fight. And it was more so his team because let's not forget, this is a guy who hasn't fought since April of last year. Right?

So, I mean, come on. Give the guy break. That's fine. wants to get the cobwebs out, wants to get back on track, doesn't need a five-round fight, doesn't feel like he needs it. That's cool. It's still taking the Ferguson fight, not turning down any fight, but just didn't want the five-round fight. I'm okay with that. I appreciate that kind of honesty. Still a super tough fight. Ferguson has looked fantastic, and I love it. It's great that it's on a big weekend. A lot of people will be talking about it. I just hope that Habib is healthy enough to fight and makes it to the fight. It's very unfortunate what's happened to him. Remember, this is a guy who in his last fight defeated Hafeald dos Santos. rather convincingly in Orlando Has not fought since

Was supposed to fight Donald Soroni That was announced in July Pulls out due to an ACL injury Makes it all the way back Gets injured Prior to the Sorony fight again Memorial Day weekend Has his return delayed a little bit

Was hoping to return in October Now it's December So I miss Chabib Sells his fights well is tough I want to see if he's the real deal so I hope this doesn't cut short. I hope we don't have a dominant crew situation on our hands here where he's gone for three years.

And I love this matchmaking. I think we were talking about Ferguson not that long ago and who would make sense for him and Eddie Alvarez or so. And Eddie's obviously, you know, he's coming off a tough fight, broke his orbital and all that. This is a great matchup. I love it. It's main event worthy, but he didn't want the main event.

That's cool. We'll get another main event. I like it. I think it's great. I mean, honestly, you look at the division, unless I'm forgetting someone, I feel like this could be a number one contender fight. Am I crazy?

I hate this fight, by the way. Why? Because I love them both so much. Oh. Because these are two guys that I really think could both be champions. Chbibbis 3 and Ferguson's 9. So yeah. I think it's great.

Look, it makes perfect sense on paper, but it breaks my heart. Because I think... But it's not like... Do you agree with me that it's not like... You know, when Amanda Nunes won her fight in early August, people were saying put Nunes against Holly Home. And I said that doesn't make sense because you're killing off a contender in a division that doesn't have a lot of contenders. Lightweight has so many contenders that you can afford to make these fights.

And people, you know, they don't lose, like it's sort of to a lesser degree, Neil Magny, loses to Maya, comes back, wins, and now you're sort of back on track. Yeah, he's pretty much in the same spot. You know what I mean? I agree with you. And I also think that, let's say, Habib is the one who loses. You can easily explain to a way, look, he was coming off a huge. layoff he comes back um you know loses this fight he gets one more where he looks healthy and then he's back on track and conversely you know with how good habib has looked if tony ferguson drops this one

you know like the magni maya situation win one more and then you're right back in there so i don't think i don't think this is a contender killer but man i hate to see it personally yeah i don't feel you know that close to either the guy where i'm all sad about it and will go as far as say, I hate it, but I get what you're trying to say. It's great matchmaking. It is, look, the fans are going to benefit greatly from this one. I think Tony Ferguson is one of the only guys who can really pose problems for Habib in the sense that he's such a smothering grinder, and Tony is willing to take so many

risks in his jujitsu, both offensively and defensively, that he's going to create a fight where many others can't, including, you know, the champion, Hafeiados Andros, when he met Habib, last time, he got completely smothered. His jiu-jitsu game was not competitive against the wrestling of Nirmagamatov. So I think we're in for a really exciting fight there, and I think it's one of the only people who can really pose problems to somebody like him in the division.

By the way, it's Habib. Give me a Khhab. Yeah, why do people say Kabib? It's Khabib. Chhabib. There you go. Perfect. It's the Jewish in me.

Are you Jewish? You're not Jewish. Come on. Your mom. Yeah. Well, that makes you Jewish, doesn't it? Yes, 100%. I'd like to see you embrace it more. That's all I'm saying. I saw someone on the YouTube chats, the chat room, saying, where are the Jews? That's it? That's what they're saying. Where are the Jews?

That's all they're worried about. Okay, how about this question? Yes. What do you think of the possible Lombark-Cote fight? Yes. And should Neil Magne get another shot at a top-10 fighter? Well, of course he should. some point.

What about next, though? Well, he's 15. Hmm. Well, I tell you, no, I want to see them save Gunner Nelson for Damien Maya. I know it won't happen in Dublin, but put it 194 weekend.

Tough finale. Make that the main event of the damn tough finale, right? If Rick Story's injury isn't too severe, I'd like to see Rick Story versus Neil Magny. 10 versus 15.

I mean, that would make sense after Story was supposed to fight after Story was supposed to fight. So yeah, I mean, it makes sense that he would get that shot instead. Now, the other question is Cote Lombard. I spoke about this earlier. Look, I said I give Cote a lot of props. I love the fact that he called someone out.

He had something in his mind, tough words, some harsh words for Lombard. I do like the Rory Lombard idea that he mentioned earlier. Lombard's not even ranked. They took him off the rankings because of the suspension. So we'll see what happens. But yeah, why not?

Sure, if they want to give it to him. Look, Cote's in the, I guess the twilight of his career, even though he's looking good, his fun fight, got a fight of the night. That's what he wants. You know what? Maybe Lombard doesn't deserve a big fight like Roy McDonald upon returning.

Maybe that's part of the punishment process, right? Sure. I could see that. So, yeah, give him Cote. He wants it. I think that's a fine fight. And then if he wins that, maybe he fights Rory McDonald. Hmm.

have we discussed the Rumble Yoga Mat incident? Oh, a Rumble Johnson? Yes. No, I have not discussed that. So what are your thoughts on that? This person asked specifically, any chance of Rumble getting in trouble for the yoga mat throwing into it. Well, I guess there's always a chance.

They said that they're looking into it. Let me see. I wonder if he has written on Twitter. He apologized. He apologized, but then he kind of deleted everything, right? Maybe. That I don't know. I know he said, you know, I should have.

So in case you didn't catch this one, had an issue, right? He had an issue with a woman at his gym, went on Facebook, was obviously fired up enough to go on Facebook and invent about it. On paper, it didn't sound like the most enjoyable experience for everyone involved. And then on Twitter was kind of defending his actions. Okay. Now, the problem is he has a history here. you know he was suspended indefinitely prior to the gusts infight they were figuring out what was going on he's been accused of domestic violence so i mean

this is this is not his first his first rodeo when it comes to these things this is not his first offense so to speak um and and the fact that he came out and said it himself to me as i said on the mab it's like you know what maybe some people shouldn't have social media you know maybe some people should just keep their thoughts to themselves maybe it's just too dangerous for some people to have social media i mean in this case he kind of outed himself, but who knows? I don't know who this woman is. I don't know if she would have even done anything. So perhaps that made it look worse. Perhaps it didn't. I don't know. Cudos to the UFC. They're looking into it. They're investigating. UFC 191 is what two weeks away? Less than two weeks away. And as of now, no word. I don't know. I have a feeling he stays on the card. What do you

think? How do you feel about like the specific thing? I don't feel like it was that big a deal, to be honest. Look, it's coming from The guy. Now, that's the fair point there. Right. So who knows what really happened. Yes. But if you look at it at face value, I feel like we're judging something based on his past

transgressions or, you know, what, you know. It was aggressive. I mean, even like, the insults. I mean, it's unnecessary in the first place. Why even post about it on Facebook at all? But he, it's not, you know, I think, I think there, the, the outcry was a little bit much, in my opinion. And I don't think on face value, he threw a yo-old.

at and he was, you know, saying, you know, the names he called her, unnecessary, sure. But it wasn't, you know, it was just a fight. It was just a verbal altercation. As I said to the guys at the MMA beat, I feel uncomfortable with the idea of even breaking this down because this, no, I'll be honest, because it feels like, I mean, this is stuff that happens in their personal lives. Like, this extends way beyond the MMA scope. Yes, it's an MMA fighter with a history. with a fight coming up, you know, with a lot at stake. But you know what I mean? Like, for us to actually dissect his words on Facebook seems, I don't know, it seems a little careless.

Well, that's why I think the investigation is the right thing. You know, look into it. If it turns out to have been nothing more than, you know, this verbal altercation and possibly throwing of a yoga mat, then that's it. But if it turns out to be something more than that, then you did, you know, to do diligence and found out. But, you know. I like the fact that the UFC got ahead of it to put out this statement.

They're looking into it. What that entails, who knows, but two years ago, they're not doing that sort of thing. So that's progress. I mean, you'd like for them to not have to deal with this at all, but at least they're policing themselves, which is what we've wanted for a long time. And it's tough. You've got 500 fighters, alpha males, you know, all these guys. It's tough, but I think they're doing, they're getting better, and that's encouraging. This has come up a few times in the past week.

The IV ban. Yes. Now, they had recently mentioned that there will be very strict sanctions on this. Do you think the ban will help fighters in the long run, considering they will be forced to fight closer to the natural weight? They won't be dehydrated in essence and have a long career as seen in the heavyweight division and better performances? I think the jury is still out on that one. I think that's definitely one of the byproducts that could happen.

I think there are other, you know, we might get into this at a later date, but Herb Dean has a new product that he claims is like the oral version of IVs. You know, it's like an oral IV. Now that presents different problems because everyone says that, look, when you use IVs, the benefit is that your stomach doesn't expand too quickly and you feel bloated full, all that stuff. Now you're taking in orally, that could be a problem. But he claims to have patented some new product that is an,

oral IV but doesn't create these issues for a fighter. So maybe that's the future. You know, there's the other thing. Back in the day, in the old days, they used to use, you know, IVs with glass bottles. Jeff Novitsky talked about on the show how you can get the plastic in one system in their blood. Traces of it will come up. What if they go to the glass bottles? I mean, it's super heavy and, I mean, technically you're not allowed to use the IVs, period, but we'll fighters resort to that. I don't know. I think it's new territory. I think that the most interesting part of the entire IV ban is that the UFC did not want to ban IVs. Both Jeff Novitsky and others have told me this on the record. Nivitsky on this show, right? He said that they didn't

want to ban it, but this is a product of them linking up with Usada. It's banned in the Wadda code. we spoke to Travis Tygard about it. It's something that they cannot allow if they're going to be 100% on board with USADA. But it sounds like they only found out about this after the fact. That to me is unbelievable. Yeah, this is a very important part of the process. It's super dangerous. Yeah.

It's dangerous on two fronts. It's dangerous because A, guys use this to rehydrate and B, as close to 100% as possible in their fights. But also, I mean, it just puts a real spotlight on one of the dirtiest parts of this sport. One of the most controversial parts of this sport. And I always go back to that

interview that we had with head of the California Commission. Andy Foster, yes. You realize I've been talking for two hours straight almost at this point. If not more. Yes. Well, I just mean like since this whole thing happened. Andy Foster, yeah. Who said,

who said that that the weight-cutting issue in MMA is worse than the PED issue. Now, I don't know if I agree with that 100%, but something serious can happen in this sport, given the fact that, you know, guys are doing these extreme cuts. So there's a lot that I think in 20 years we're going to look back at this time with the extreme cuts, with the IVs, with the amount that people are putting back on,

with the amount that they're taking off 25 hours before. I mean, it's the Wild West out there. Maybe, back to your point, maybe this makes guys cut less. Who knows? but I don't know if I'm qualified enough, honestly. I don't know if I'm smart enough medically to really understand what's at play here because it seems like serious stuff.

It's certainly a big issue. I think it's an issue, but I wouldn't call it. I think you said it was like dirty or... I don't think so. What guys are doing to cut weight and females as well. I mean, this is not good. It's not healthy.

No, it's not healthy to cut that much weight and then to add that much weight. It's not good. No, I think it's natural. I think it is a very big issue. I think I'm almost on the same page with Andy Foster here that I think it is as big or if not bigger an issue than performance enhancing drugs in the sport because it's so widespread but done in plain sight. But that said, I think that when it is banned, I don't see it lingering as much as perhaps PED as well. Now, there will be people who, you know, try to skirt it and, you know, whatever the case may be.

But I think it will be more obvious in that sense that you'll see these people dehydrated on the scales and then the next night they've gained, you know, 20 to 30 pounds. You don't think that's serious? What do you mean? I think that's very serious. No, but like, PDs are dangerous because of, A, what it can do to you if abused, but also what it does to your opponent, right? I think more so in this day and age, what it can do to your opponent. A, you have more cardio, you're able to sustain certain things, you're strong, all that stuff, and you're able to recover, blah, blah, blah.

Here, you are essentially, you know, you're putting yourself at risk. I'm not saying by not using, you know, IVs, it's just by the amount guys are weight cutting. So that's why I go back to the original point. If this can encourage fighters to not cut as much weight, then I actually think it's a good thing. But if fighters are still going to cut the same amount of weight and hope that they are going to be as rehydrated as when they were putting the IVs in we might see some

some really depleted fighters and then it could get really dirty, really dangerous. I think that initially when I first thought of this I thought that that might be more likely to happen is where they're putting themselves in more danger but I think with a complete ban of IVs I think we'll see people fighting closer

to their natural weight class. Which I think is good. I think it's great. And I've seen some fighters come out it's not all negative. Some have said you can't make weight and then fight the next day without an IV, then you shouldn't be fighting. Then you're doing it all wrong. So, look, even George Lockhart said it on this show.

And he's a professional. I trust his opinion. Now, there are others in his same field who will say the opposite. But if there are some people out there who believe this, then there's some hope for all of us, or at least for the fighters. No, I agree with that. And, you know, don't get me wrong. I think this is a huge issue. I think it's a very, very big issue. But what I was saying was I just think that you're not harming anybody, but yourself in this case where the you know the cheating aspect of it i feel like steroids is very um steroids is very cut and dry in that respect you're gaining an unfair advantage whereas in this um it's only yourself that you're that you're really harming now that's that's important you don't want

our we don't want our athletes in m mma to to harm themselves um but i think there's a i think on the scale of what I would say is worse. I don't know what the word I'm searching for is, but what I would say is more an affront to the rules is PEDs versus this. But in terms of danger, I'd say it's right up there, equal if not more. We might look back on 2015 as one of the most revolutionary years in the history of the sport, or at least in a very long time with the Reebok deal, how that affected sponsors and all that with what Rhonda did this year, and who knows what's to come, with the drug testing and,

you know, the side issues, IVs, all that stuff. I mean, there's a lot of serious heavy-duty stuff going on in this sport that every year feels like the sky's falling. There's big deals, but it's usually, you know, also what they're doing with injuries as far as like, you know, going to those centers where the pro athletes going, linking up with the Detroit Pistons and all. I mean, there's a lot of game-changing stuff going on. So, yeah, it's a really interesting time. Absolutely. Okay.

We're going back to the website for some questions. All right. I guess we got five minutes left until I got to make that decision. No sign of the telephones? No. Or the stream. It's very sad. It's a very sad day in the history of the show.

Black Monday. It can forever be known. Well, you joke. I'm being serious. I'm being serious as well. It didn't seem like it. Eric Silva. Yes.

You may have touched on this. Is it me or did Eric Silva look weak and sluggish? What do you make of his standing in the division? Yeah, I did touch on it a little bit. disappointed. I mean, I don't know what to make of his physique. I mean, that was kind of obvious. And I think we know who Eric Silva is. I mean, he's going to win one. He's going to lose one. He's going to always, for the most part, be relatively exciting. But I don't think he is going to turn in, at least right now, I mean, we've seen crazier things where guys have turned things around. But I don't

think he is going to, he hasn't shown us that he's going to turn into the prospect slash contender that we thought he was going to be. Is that fair to say? I think a lot of people were very high on it. I think he's still relative... You know, the funny thing about him is he's not as young as a lot of people think he is. Yeah. He's pushing 30. I think he's either 29 or 30.

Yeah. So I think at this point you can kind of get... I mean, it's not like he was Robbie Lawler who had shown signs of greatness and then, you know, had a downtime and now he's back. Eric, the jury was always kind of out on him, but we had high hopes given his... his early UFC run and I think his look had something to do with it and just the way his early fights went. I mean, they were explosive. They were fun, all that stuff. But, you know, he goes into that Carlo Prater fight, 13 and 1, 1-1, 1-0 contest, had just won his UFC debut. And of course, a lot of these fights are happening in Brazil and, you know, you never really know about the

level of competition. Most of them don't even have Wikipedia pages, for God's sakes. When is Justin Gachie going to get one? Anyway, 13-1, 1-0 contest. Beats, loose Ramos via knockout in 40 seconds. Then Carlo Prater should have probably won that fight, but anyway, it was called in Prater's favor because of the DQ. Then beats Brennaman loses the Fitch. Beats High, loses Dungan Kim. Beats Sado loses to Matt Brown. Beats Rhodes and Cost Check. So now, all right, what are we? And then it loses Neomagney. Last two wins were solid, but it just always seems like yes, no, yes, no, yes, no. How does Justin Gates you not have a Wikipedia page. Isn't that wild?

I don't even know. I feel like someone's messing with him. He has a Spanish Wikipedia page. Oh, I'm sorry, Portuguese Wikipedia page. But he doesn't have a Wikipedia page. That's even weirder. Max Holloway's celebration the sign the check gesture.

Max could clearly be heard saying sign the check Sean to someone ringside right out of the fight. Was he talking to Sean Shelby? Was this related to a bonus? Did he think you deserved a bonus for a fighter injuring himself? Was it? I don't know. I didn't see that. Did you? Yeah, I did see him say he signed the check to somebody.

Maybe just the win bonus. I guess the win bonus. It would be very weird if it was for like a performance bonus because, you know, obviously Olivera got hurt. But, I don't know. I guess you got an angle where you can. Yeah, I didn't see it. It might have been while I was sleeping there for a second.

The routine. Yes, the routine. Yeah, he deserves a win bonus he won. Like I said, it's, and you said as well, it's a gray area. He earned it. He went through the camp. He showed up. He didn't get injured. I have no problem with it. We've got Larry Bird commentary. We've got Taylor Swift commentary in our comment section. What comment section? For the website.

I thought we went to Twitter. No, no, no. This is all from the website. Are we done with Twitter? Yeah. Okay. Well, it's 429. How about that? Right on the dot. I just got an email from one of the guys working on the show, and he said it doesn't seem like the phones are going to be up. They're still down office-wide right now. I've been working on getting our systems specifically back up,

but it seems like the issue is still office-wide. Exactly at 4.30. I get that news, so I guess that's that. I very much want to, above all, apologize to Michael Bisping, Dan Hardy, Ephrine Escadero, and Mike Winkle-John. I was so looking forward. I even told you before the show

how much I was looking forward to talking to Dan Hardy because he has a great story. and doing some fun stuff and Winkle John with Home, it's just incredibly disappointing. And I apologize to the fans who tuned in. We're tuning in live, and we left them hanging on a Monday. You'll get around two hours or so of us shooting the breeze,

answering questions and all that, but not what you had signed up for, and I apologize for that. You can hit my music. This reminds me of that episode that we did with John Jones. Before anyone's time here, in that weird studio that turned out to be... That was up until this point my least favorite show

because it was just a mess. But we still got to all the interviews. That was the amazing part. This is the first time I believe in the history of the show where we can't even get to the interviews. And I find that to be very surprising. How do we not have phone lines that work? can't just rely on the internet.

Seems like a very unreliable option. Anyway, if you're watching or listening to this replay after the fact, I do appreciate your patience. I appreciate you tuning into a very strange version of the show, but I appreciate you nonetheless. If you complained or said that you're going to boycott or said you're going to leave us, good riddance, see you later.

Adios. I have nothing to say to you. Now, I want to thank John Pollock for stopping by. insight as always. I want to thank Luke Rockhold. Can't wait for that fight. Best of luck to him. I want to thank Ali Abdel Aziz, who certainly brought it strong today on the show. Thank you very much to Carlos Condit. Thank you very much to Michael Bisping. One of those shows where I stacked the deck, and if it was a typical kind of show and we'd end at 245, it wouldn't be as tough of a pill to swallow. I'm sorry to Dan Hardy, Ephrinus Godero,

and Mike Winkle-John. Hopefully we'll get them on at a later date. Maybe back next week, who the hell knows. Until then, I say peace. I'm out of you. Support for this show comes from Figma. Figma is the place where teams turn ideas into the world's best digital products. And now Figma is introducing a faster way to make those ideas real with Figma Make. It's an AI-powered prompt decode tool that turns your ideas or your Figma designs into interactive code-backed prototypes in minutes.

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